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Springer Handbook of Robotics pp 1729–1758Cite as

Domestic Robotics

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Abstract

When the first edition of this book was published domestic robots were spoken of as a dream that was slowly becoming reality. At that time, in 2008, we looked back on more than twenty years of research and development in domestic robotics, especially in cleaning robotics. Although everybody expected cleaning to be the killer app for domestic robotics in the first half of these twenty years nothing big really happened. About ten years before the first edition of this book appeared, all of a sudden things started moving. Several small, but also some larger enterprises announced that they would soon launch domestic cleaning robots. The robotics community was anxiously awaiting these first cleaning robots and so were consumers. The big burst, however, was yet to come. The price tag of those cleaning robots was far beyond what people were willing to pay for a vacuum cleaner. It took another four years until, in 2002, a small and inexpensive device, which was not even called a cleaning robot, brought the first breakthrough: Roomba. Sales of the Roomba quickly passed the first million robots and increased rapidly. While for the first years after Roomba’s release, the big players remained on the sidelines, possibly to revise their own designs and, in particular their business models and price tags, some other small players followed quickly and came out with their own products. We reported about theses devices and their creators in the first edition. Since then the momentum in the field of domestics robotics has steadily increased. Nowadays most big appliance manufacturers have domestic cleaning robots in their portfolio. We are not only seeing more and more domestic cleaning robots and lawn mowers on the market, but we are also seeing new types of domestic robots, window cleaners, plant watering robots, tele-presence robots, domestic surveillance robots, and robotic sports devices. Some of these new types of domestic robots are still prototypes or concept studies. Others have already crossed the threshold to becoming commercial products.

For the second edition of this chapter, we have decided to not only enumerate the devices that have emerged and survived in the past five years, but also to take a look back at how it all began, contrasting this retrospection with the burst of progress in the past five years in domestic cleaning robotics. We will not describe and discuss in detail every single cleaning robot that has seen the light of the day, but select those that are representative for the evolution of the technology as well as the market. We will also reserve some space for new types of mobile domestic robots, which will be the success stories or failures for the next edition of this chapter. Further we will look into nonmobile domestic robots, also called smart appliances, and examine their fate. Last but not least, we will look at the recent developments in the area of intelligent homes that surround and, at times, also control the mobile domestic robots and smart appliances described in the preceding sections.

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Abbreviations

2-D:

two-dimensional

2.5-D:

two-and-a-half-dimensional

3-D:

three-dimensional

AIST:

Japan National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology

B2B:

business to business

BOM:

bill of material

CES:

Consumer Electronics Show

CMOS:

complementary metal-oxide-semiconductor

CPU:

central processing unit

cv-SLAM:

ceiling vision SLAM

EKF:

extended Kalman filter

FDA:

US Food and Drug Association

GPS:

global positioning system

HCI:

human–computer interaction

HD:

high definition

IFA:

Internationale Funk Ausstellung

IMU:

inertial measurement unit

IPA:

Institute for Manufacturing Engineering and Automation

IPR:

intellectual property right

IR:

infrared

LED:

light-emitting diode

PSD:

position-sensitive-device

RAM:

random access memory

RFID:

radio frequency identification

RMS:

root mean square

RP-VITA:

remote presence virtual + independent telemedicine assistant

RPS:

room positioning system

SELF:

sensorized environment for life

SLAM:

simultaneous localization and mapping

TOF:

time-of-flight

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Computer Sciences, Bonn-Rhein-Sieg Univ. of Applied Sciences, Grantham-Allee 20, 53754, Sankt Augustin, Germany

    Erwin Prassler

  2. iRobot Corp., 1055 East Colorado Boulevard, Suite 340, CA 91106, Pasadena, USA

    Mario E. Munich

  3. iRobot Corp., 8 Crosby Drive, MA 01730, Bedford, USA

    Paolo Pirjanian

  4. System Robotics Laboratory, Tohoku University, Aoba 6-6-01, Aramaki, 980-8579, Sendai, Japan

    Kazuhiro Kosuge

Authors
  1. Erwin Prassler
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  2. Mario E. Munich
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  3. Paolo Pirjanian
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  4. Kazuhiro Kosuge
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Erwin Prassler .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Electrical Engineering, University of Naples Federico II, Via Claudio 21, 80125, Naples, Italy

    Bruno Siciliano

  2. Department of Computer Sciences, Artificial Intelligence Laboratory, Stanford University, 450 Serra Mall, CA 94305, Stanford, USA

    Oussama Khatib

Video-References

Video-References

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Robotic Vacuum Cleaners Reviewed by Click – Spring 2014 available from http://handbookofrobotics.org/view-chapter/65/videodetails/727

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How would you choose the best Robotic Vacuum Cleaner? available from http://handbookofrobotics.org/view-chapter/65/videodetails/729

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Husqvarna Automower versus competitors available from http://handbookofrobotics.org/view-chapter/65/videodetails/731

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Windoro window cleaning robot review available from http://handbookofrobotics.org/view-chapter/65/videodetails/734

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WINBOT W710 versus HOBOT 168 available from http://handbookofrobotics.org/view-chapter/65/videodetails/735

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Winbot window cleaning robot available from http://handbookofrobotics.org/view-chapter/65/videodetails/736

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Serbot Robot Clean Ant Profi available from http://handbookofrobotics.org/view-chapter/65/videodetails/737

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Home Pool Cleaner Review – 5 types of robotic cleaners available from http://handbookofrobotics.org/view-chapter/65/videodetails/739

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Automatic pool cleaner reviews available from http://handbookofrobotics.org/view-chapter/65/videodetails/740

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Telepresence robot in action available from http://handbookofrobotics.org/view-chapter/65/videodetails/741

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Double robotics – overview available from http://handbookofrobotics.org/view-chapter/65/videodetails/742

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Test-Driving Beam, the telepresence robot available from http://handbookofrobotics.org/view-chapter/65/videodetails/744

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Beam’s new Palo Alto store lets telepresence robots sell themselves. Literally available from http://handbookofrobotics.org/view-chapter/65/videodetails/745

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This robot is your running coach – Joggobot available from http://handbookofrobotics.org/view-chapter/65/videodetails/746

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RUFUS – your personal running coach available from http://handbookofrobotics.org/view-chapter/65/videodetails/747

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PhillieBot robot gives first pitch at a Phillies game available from http://handbookofrobotics.org/view-chapter/65/videodetails/748

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Prassler, E., Munich, M.E., Pirjanian, P., Kosuge, K. (2016). Domestic Robotics. In: Siciliano, B., Khatib, O. (eds) Springer Handbook of Robotics. Springer Handbooks. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-32552-1_65

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-32552-1_65

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  • Publisher Name: Springer, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-319-32550-7

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-319-32552-1

  • eBook Packages: EngineeringEngineering (R0)

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