Everyday Living Assisted by Network of Service Robots

Abstract

With the global momentum that 5G has been driving, cyber-physical control applications have recently attracted a lot of attention. The basic idea is to utilize the communication technology between two entities even when they are logically and geographically separated so as to provide necessary command, control, and information in time and on time. The 3rd Generation Partnership Project's (3GPP's) effort on technical enhancement to accommodate time-sensitive networking (TSN) associated with clock synchronization will enable many industry applications, such as smart factory and critical infrastructure operations, and tele-health applications. Following this technology advancement, several challenging points have been widely identified among global forums toward the next generation, or 6G, to further enhance the capability of communication technology that can support new applications and usage scenarios in unstructured environments as opposed to those in structured and tame working environments as described in Next G Alliance Report: 6G Applications and Use Cases published by the Alliance for Telecommunications Industry Solutions (ATIS) [1]. We focus on communication technology aspects that are relevant to support a network of service robots (SOBOTs) that stay with humans and understand natural forms of interactions between humans and robots and/or between robots in order to make decisions and perform tasks as described in a recent IEEE article on SOBOTs [2]. In this column, we address the recent advancement in 5G communication technologies and their potential relation to system enhancements to support SOBOT operations. We begin by addressing the implications and expected roles of SOBOTs, which is followed by recent advancements in 3GPP standards and further consideration points.