Proactive Human-Robot Collaboration Toward Human-Centric Smart Manufacturing

Proactive Human-Robot Collaboration Toward Human-Centric Smart Manufacturing is driven by an appreciation of manufacturing scenarios where human and robotic agents can understand each other's actions and conduct mutual-cognitive, predictable, and self-organizing teamwork. Modern factories' smart manufacturing transformation and the evolution of relationships between humans and robots in manufacturing tasks set the scene for a discussion on the technical fundamentals of state-of-the-art proactive human-robot collaboration; these are further elaborated into the three main steps (i.e., mutual-cognitive and empathic coworking; predictable spatio-temporal collaboration; self-organizing multiagent teamwork) to achieve an advanced form of symbiotic HRC with high-level, dynamic-reasoning teamwork skills. The authors then present a deployment roadmap and several case studies, providing step-by-step guidance for real-world application of these ground-breaking methods which crucially contribute to the maturing of human-centric, sustainable, and resilient production systems. The volume proves to be an invaluable resource that supports understanding and learning for users ranging from upper undergraduate/graduate students and academic researchers to engineering professionals in a variety of industry contexts. - Offers pioneering information on an industry 5.0 topic that has attracted much research interest in recent years - Takes advantage of a structured and comprehensive approach to seamlessly combine theory, latest technological developments, and their practical applications - Includes actionable methods, while conceptualizing future implications for smart manufacturing

Shufei Li is currently a Postdoctoral Fellow in the Department of Industrial and Systems Engineering at The Hong Kong Polytechnic University. His research interests are focused on smart manufacturing and intelligent robotics, including human-robot collaboration, embodied AI, and augmented reality. Dr. Li is a member of IEEE and serves as a reviewer for many high-impact, international journals in the manufacturing and industrial engineering field. He has published over ten SCIE-indexed journal articles, won an International Best Conference Paper Award, and multiple domestic Innovation and Entrepreneurship awards.