This project investigates how Mixed Reality (MR) can enhance the experience of Human-Robot Interaction (HRI) for crafting tasks, aiming to preserve the positive aspects of user experience and feeling of craftsmanship.
Initiated with an interest in the growth of MR and robotic automation, the research examines how MR might bridge the gap between user satisfaction and the increasing robot implementation in automating tasks execution. While automation streamlines repetitive or labour-intensive tasks, it often removes aspects that contribute to user engagement and job satisfaction. MR, as an immersive and interactive tool, offers a promising solution to enabling users to control and collaborate with robots in a more intuitive and meaningful way.
The project is built around the research question: “How can a unilateral vision-based control system, implemented through a Mixed Reality headset, enable telemanipulation of a robotic arm for crafting purposes, without disrupting the user’s experience and performance?”
The study defines MR’s unique potential for HRI by leveraging vision-based hand-tracking to control a robotic arm, specifically in a crafting task. A prototype was developed to explore the interaction dynamics, using, due to technical constraints, virtual reality to simulate the MR interaction and the robot The primary goal was to design an interaction system that offers full control of spatial navigation and force application, allowing the direct and real-time adjustments essential to a crafting task.
The iterative design process involved testing multiple prototypes with users, identifying challenges and the experience in relation to craftsmanship. Key issues identified included difficulty in manipulating the robot precisely, due to the absence of haptic feedback, limited visual depth awareness, and a reliance on visual-only feedback, which, while informative, have a low robustness and clutters the user interface. These findings lead to the design of three revised prototypes with various constraint levels, one with full user autonomy, one with low constraints and a one highly constrained, to test the impact on user experience and task effectiveness and find the right balance between user control and ease of manipulation.
The results indicate that the low-constraint system provided the most positive user experience, finding the right balance between user control and guidance while maintaining the essential qualities of craftsmanship. Although MR offers a viable framework for enhancing user experience in HRI, the research highlights limitations in replicating the experience of real-world crafting. The study concludes by recommending that future MR applications should leverage MR’s unique qualities, rather than simply mimicking traditional crafting qualities, to foster novel, user-centred interactions.

Technological innovation can provide valuable solutions for the challenges facing the Dutch healthcare sector. However, the development of such innovations poses transdisciplinary challenges in aligning academic research, practice, and technology. This graduation project addresses those challenges by conducting exploratory design research for the bedside nursing practice at the Children’s Thorax Center at Erasmus MC Sophia Children’s Hospital.

The initial phase of the project focused on gaining familiarity with the bedside nursing practice to establish preliminary insights for desired changes. Two nurses were shadowed during their shifts at the aforementioned pediatric ward, employing a contextual inquiry research method to gather observational insights and enhance the understanding of bedside nursing. A reflective analysis of practice understanding, established through nurse feedback and observations, resulted in a list of desired transformations within the practice. These transformations were validated and further elaborated upon through a group feedback session with nurses, which culminated in primary design opportunities involving improved local accessibility of medical data for both input and retrieval, interpersonal communication, and memory support.

The second phase focused on further defining strategic opportunities for innovation development and bridging insights from current practice to a design direction for the desired future. The analysis of four practice dimensions relating to tangibility and relativity resulted in ‘personal cognitive support for nurses at the bedside’ being identified as the most valuable strategic focus for novel technology research and design development. Subsequently, a future perspective of bedside nursing practice was explored through a generative session with nurses, further highlighting the need for cognitive support and technology accessibility at the bedside. This led to a design direction pursuing the development of a cognitive assistant within a future perspective involving pervasive computing.

The third and final phase of the project involved Research through Design development, using a bridging concept for a cognitive assistant named the Cognitive Companion (Coco). Coco is developed as an AI-enabled wearable device, worn in the chest pocket of the nursing uniform, to provide nurses with always-accessible cognitive assistance wherever they go. It features the operational ease of voice control using AI speech recognition, suited for interactions at the bedside. The purpose of Coco as a bridging concept is to facilitate further research and design development in nursing practice toward the realization of the pervasive computing future perspective. To achieve this, a pretotype was built and used in real nursing practice. This revealed that current interventions force nurses to adjust their practice to accommodate technology interactions, which adds extra mental strain by demanding their focus and mental energy during bedside care.

Ultimately, this project concludes that future technological developments for bedside nursing should focus on human interactions and care, which are fundamental aspects that must be safeguarded. Interactions with technology interventions should be simple, easily accessible, and seamlessly integrated into the practice surroundings so that they support rather than distract from patient care. The proposal building on these findings follows a future perspective of pervasive computing in practice, which can be supported through the development of the Coco AI-enabled wearable.

The low frequency radio waves of 10 kHz to 30 MHz are in a frequency band that is hard to measure when on Earth. As this frequency band holds information about the very start of the universe, scientists are eager to do measurements. Together with the TU Delft Space Institute, dr. ir. Chris Verhoeven wants to set up a mission of a swarm of 50 12U-CubeSats that orbit the moon. The difficulty in measuring these radio waves lies in the required antenna length of 5 metres, while having extremely limited storage space within these CubeSats.

Over the past decades, several types of antennas, such as inflatables and origami-structures, have been studied and researched in order to develop one that can be deployed. Yet, no applicable antenna for CubeSats has been designed to sufficiently measure these radio waves.

In this thesis, a solution to this problem is proposed. Based on calculations, simulations and tests, an antenna is evaluated and improved upon. The end result is BEAD, a Beaded Expanding Antenna Design. BEAD is an antenna consisting of several parts that are connected and tightened with the help of a copper wire. Six antennas of 8.8 metres can be stored in one 12U-CubeSat. BEAD is a stiff and strong design that can handle manoeuvres of the satellite. At its end-of-life stage, the antennas can be retracted to minimise negative impacts.

Using plant-hybrid technologies presents an unusual design opportunity, by combining living plants with technology. This master’s thesis delves into the integration of plant-hybrid robotics, exploring human-plant interaction systems. The study explores the potential design implications of this field, particularly in public settings where interactions with humans are unavoidable. This way, the project aims to stimulate design for physical and psychological connections between humans, nature and technology.

RoBotanics, the case study in this exploration, focuses on designing an extremely slow-moving swarm of plants that subtly roam public indoor spaces. This way the concept subtly tries to express the passage of time. Plants lack the capacity for verbal communication or auditory perception like humans. Instead, the concept allows the plants to rely on sensing through its leaves. The physical properties of the selected plant, Dypsis Lutescens, allows the plant-hybrid robot to have a large amount of ‘antennae’ (like insects) on all sides. This quality enhances the range of the plant sensor. The plant collects data on human-plant activity, which informs its navigation. This equips plants with subtle autonomy, bringing more liveliness to an otherwise static environment.

The prototype has demonstrated that inattentional blindness allows the plant to quietly navigate shared spaces with humans without causing distraction. Moreover, varying slow speeds affect the plant’s physiological dynamics uniquely, triggering different responses. This case study contributes to the field of human-plant interaction by highlighting the potential for plant-hybrid robots to coexist alongside humans.

This project was focused on designing and prototyping a mobile robotic builder using additive manufacturing. This robotic builder is meant to be a part of a larger fleet of robotic builders that use swarm based strategies to build structures using simple behavioral rules. The concept was inspired by the biological phenomenon that are termites, whom are able to build large mounds with complex structures and architecture on the inside without having a centralized control unit. Separate agents that are able to efficient and effectively collaborate.
The project focused on designing a singular robotic builder for that context. The builder is supposed to be mobile, compact and able to climb its own structures. The builder was also supposed to utilize fused deposition modeling (FDM) printing as its main method of building, mimicking the depositioning of dirt by a termite.
Various brainstorm theories and processes were used to conceptualize different form factors of the robotic builder. All of the concepts were evaluated using standarized methods and further developed.
The final proposed design consists of two main components, the mobile platform and the 3D printer. The design incorporates a SCARA robotic arm for the 3D printing as it has many good properties that fit the context of the project while remaining relative simple in terms of kinematics. The mobile platform includes a whegs system to be able to climb its own printed structures and a leveling mechanism to be able to print in various orientations. The mobile platform was not further developed.
Iterations of the SCARA design were done using CAD software to reduce the development time. After evaluation, a final design was chosen that combined all of the best traits of the previous designs. The design’s main traits were that it was lightweight, simple, bare bones and highly customizable. Relative easy assembly was important as the design will be open-source. Off the shelf components were evaluated on its capabilities and integrated into the system as fit.
The final prototype, a SCARA printer, was able to produce promising results. The prototype was able to print faster than regular printers, print stronger structures and still be sufficiently accurate.
Additionally, a voxel based printing strategy was proposed to help improve the print time more and reduce material usage. The voxel-based approach offers the advantage of enabling a system to be fully optimized for its specific voxel requirements. Italsosimplifiedtheprocessandstrategyofusing FDM-printing in a less controlled environment.
The project provides a foundational design for future SCARA printers, paving the way for continued advancements in swarm robotic construction technology. The final SCARA design is highly customizable and adjust- able with firmware that matches those traits.
Although the project lays down a well thought out foundation, a lot more research and work must be done to properly develop a robotic builder that is ready to implement swarm strategies. The most crucial aspects are mobility, leveling and consistency. Additionally, further optimization of the SCARA printer as a whole and its voxel strategy is necessary.

As robots become increasingly popular and co-inhabit spaces with people, there is a need for designing robots that people are comfortable interacting with. For robots to successfully integrate into human society, it is important to design robots in a way that enhances the quality of the human-robot interaction. While the human-robot relationship typically exists to serve people, there will be instances when robots require human assistance. This project aims to investigate people’s interactions with robots that need their assistance. It employs a robot designed to test people’s willingness to help it achieve a goal under various scenarios.
The project in its entirety was quite an ambitious one given the limited scope of a graduation project. A literature review carried at the beginning helped identify key features a robot and an interaction should have, in order for it to be perceived positively by humans interacting with it. This review culminated in a list of design considerations which informed the design and the interaction. These design considerations were referred to throughout the project, while choosing ideas for the interaction and while detailing the chosen scenario. A state machine was used to explain the general behavioural states of the robot, and the electronic components that facilitated the desired interaction were chosen. These components were coded to reflect the desired behaviour of the robot during the interaction. Alongside this process, the robot was embodied as sub-assemblies incorporating these components. Once the robot was given a form, the components were designed to fit within a modular body that accounted for zoomorphic and anthropomorphic features, while retaining functionality of the components inside. During its embodiment, the robot was given the ability to express itself through displayed speech, sounds, facial expressions and body language. Additional structures like "nests" were also designed to support the robot's interaction. Once the interaction was designed and embodied, the robot was then plot tested, before being used as a research probe to conduct human-robot interaction (HRI) experiments to address the research questions outlined at the start of the project. Data was gathered through data logging via the robot, user observations and interviews. The results of the experiments indicate that people's willingness to help a robot is influenced by the narrative of a human-robot interaction, the effort level of the task required to help the robot, as well as individuals' attitudes towards robots. Increasing the effort level reduced people's willingness to help the robot, but only when the narrative of the interaction was simple and functional, demonstrating that a narrative which tries to engage emotionally with participants has a positive effect on their altruistic response. The experiments were also able to shed some light on the social dynamics that emerge when a robot co-inhabits a space with people, as more people informed others about the robot.