Summer Blog - 2026
Week 1
Monday
SURI Orientation was today! Besides learning about the logistics of the orientation and visiting the lab, I also went on a scav hunt with Taylor where we went around campus and took pictures of cool items, one being a wooden crocodile. I'm feeling quite excited about this program, and I am excited to learn more about robots and engineering.
Tuesday
Today was a lighter day. I completed all the safety trainings, and finished reading a paper about the GIRAF arm and space robot.
Wednesday
I completed the in-person lab safety training and took a tour of the SRC, which is where I'll be working this summer. I also discussed research expectations and deliverables with Venny and Stanley, which will be a fully working teleoperation control system for GIRAF that they will be test. I also read a bunch of papers on current control systems for robots and brainstormed some ideas. Here are some ideas I had along with their key advantages and disadvantages.
1) Xbox
- Ads: already has an existing framework
- Disads: unintuitive, doesn't capture all movement possibilities
2) Virtual Reality
- Ads: overall positive user studies
- Disads: motion sickness
Sidenote, I really liked this paper: https://www.mdpi.com/2076-3417/10/24/9051#B37-applsci-10-09051
3) Leader follower architect
- Ads: overall positive user studies
- Disads: would probably not work for this robot as arm is 10 feet
4) BCI
- Ads: would be the most intuitive as user doesn't have to do anything but think
- Disads: would probably be pretty hard to implement & would not have as much resources to implement
5) Something similar to the Da Vinci robot
6) Something similar to an arcade machine
7) Motion capture suit
Thursday
Today was a fun day because I got to operate some robots myself (the anymal robot and the Da Vinci, which is used for surgical procedures). Some key takeaways I had were that 1) there needs to be a way for the user to assume control of the robot at the beginning and 2) there needs to be an emergency stop for the robot.
Something I noticed about the anymal robot which is what the GIRAF arm will be attached to is that coordinate axes are not intuitive because I always needed to readjust the ipad to align with the robot body. It did not help that the robot light was in the back and not the front. There was also some trial and error to get familiar with the control system which is not good in high stakes situations.
Something I noticed about the Da Vinci robot was that I really would have appreciated a haptic sensor because I could not tell how hard the robot was gripping the object or how hard I was pressing.
After reviewing these two robots, I read more papers and am thinking of creating something with virtual reality and direct manipulation interface.
Friday
Today was a national holiday, so I just finished up some papers from my dorm.
Week 2
Monday
This week, my goal is to flesh out all the details of the controller system I am going to build. Today, I completed the PRL safety training and also attended a SURI fireside chat with a current PhD student about her journey. Then, I continued reading a bunch of papers on controller systems. The following below are my notes.
UI principles
- Good if user can see battery life
- Know when an arrow happens or a limitation in the robot movement has been reached, for example, maybe when we can no longer extend or something
- Robots might be able to twist in a way that the human arm cannot twist → VR limitations
- User should be aware of what's around the robot
- Must communicate available actions to user
- Option where users can zoom in and out of existing view?
- Interface should provide hints about next moves
- User should be able to switch between views
- The information provided by the UI should prevent user errors, and if a user makes a mistake, the UI should allow for its rectification. In contrast with undoing a “Cut” operation in a word processor, a “Cut” command to prune a tree through a teleoperated agri-robot cannot be undone.
Trends
- Clear shift toward multimodal hybrids (such as haptic-immersive fusions)
communication latency remains the main obstacle, with delays over 200 ms undermining stability and safety regardless of interface complexity.
- Haptic devices are among the most active areas of teleoperation,
- Trends towards autonomy and haptic devices → maybe the person just presses a button and the thing just goes there and then you start rotating
Some other ideas
- Control a robot by moving a hologram, and use Unity, ROS, motion planning, torque simulation to safely translate that into real robot motion.
- compute joint torques from the robot’s planned motion and send that back to the AR headset as visual feedback (Manual vs automatic mode)
- Control the robot by manipulating a virtual version of it in your real environment
https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/abstract/document/6977975
https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/abstract/document/11450088
https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/abstract/document/8957294
Tuesday
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Wednesday
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Thursday
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Friday
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Weekend
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Page last modified on June 22, 2026, at 09:01 pm