Towards safe human-robot collaboration

The new robot generation, suitable for human-robot collaboration, is opening a new wide field of robot applications. In contrast to classical common industrial robot applications where robots completely are separated from humans, the collaborative robots include several options to bring them closer to humans. Both are able to work together in one work space with reasonable risks. In this paper the potential of human-robot collaboration is discussed. The achieved benefits and possible use cases are described. Relying safety functions, standards as well as related technical issues are summarized. Human-robot collaboration is applied in many areas. Some example applications are introduced and discussed. This paper ends with a conclusion and remaining open research fields.