Physical artificial intelligence (AI) is set to be one of the largest growth areas as industry moves into a new era of automation and efficiency, and looking to address this potentially hot market, NTT Docomo and Keio University Haptics Research Centre have announced they have successfully conducted a demonstration of high-precision remote robot operation over a commercial 5G network.
The Haptics Research Centre is aiming to make RealHaptics technology widely and universally available to consumers and companies worldwide. RealHaptics is an advanced force feedback system that transmits, records and reproduces the tactile sensation of touch in real time, allowing remote operators to feel the resistance, softness or texture of objects handled by a robotic device.
As a research institution for RealHaptics technology, Keio University holds a core set of related patents. The research centre operates a council for RealHaptics technology in which private companies also participate. The centre works closely with companies to carry out joint research to explore new applications for the technology.
In essence, the demo has seen the combination of Configured Grant, a network slicing scheduling method in which the base station pre-allocates communication resources to specific devices – with Keio’s Real Haptics technology, invented by Kohei Onishi, transmitting tactile and contact information bidirectionally and reproducing human force on robots.
To convey precise force feedback when a remote robot interacts with objects controlled by an operator at a distant location, mobile data communication must maintain low latency and minimal jitter. High or fluctuating latency can disrupt synchronisation between the operator and remote robot. This compromises the precise force reproduction of Real Haptics, hindering delicate robot operation.
Drilling deeper into the technological breakthrough, mobile devices normally communicate with a base station using the Dynamic Grant method. When a device has data to transmit, it first requests communication resources from the base station. The base station then allocates resources based on the status of other devices and notifies the requesting device.
The time between the resource request and actual data transmission, the scheduling delay, always occurs under Dynamic Grant, and can fluctuate depending on network conditions. This poses a major challenge for stable remote operation of advanced robots, especially in congested networks.
With Configured Grant, the base station pre-allocates exclusive communication resources to a device or line for a specific period. The device can transmit data without requesting resources, effectively eliminating scheduling delay. As a result, both latency and jitters are reduced, enabling more stable wireless remote operation.
In the experiment, Configured Grant was applied to the radio link between the terminal and base station to minimise latency and jitter. Results confirmed that latency requirements for practical teleoperation of Real Haptics robots were met, while force reproducibility and operability were improved.
Delicate force feedback and tactile sensations were transmitted stably, marking the world’s first demonstration of Configured Grant enabling practical robot teleoperation over a commercial 5G network such as Docomo’s. By reducing the impact of latency in the wireless segment, the two organisations say that highly precise and delicate remote robot control can now be performed stably even under network congestion.
Docomo and Keio University have previously collaborated on the development and testing of Real Haptics for robot teleoperation over mobile networks. Going forward, the two organisations say they will continue developing and testing technologies to accelerate the practical use of advanced robot teleoperation.
