{"status":"ok","message-type":"work","message-version":"1.0.0","message":{"indexed":{"date-parts":[[2026,1,6]],"date-time":"2026-01-06T12:45:44Z","timestamp":1767703544943,"version":"build-2065373602"},"reference-count":15,"publisher":"MDPI AG","issue":"6","license":[{"start":{"date-parts":[[2012,6,14]],"date-time":"2012-06-14T00:00:00Z","timestamp":1339632000000},"content-version":"vor","delay-in-days":0,"URL":"https:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by\/3.0\/"}],"content-domain":{"domain":[],"crossmark-restriction":false},"short-container-title":["Sensors"],"abstract":"<jats:p>This paper addresses the introduction of a new Human Robot Interaction (HRI) sensor for guide robots. Guide robots for geriatric patients or the visually impaired should follow user\u2019s control command, keeping a certain desired distance allowing the user to work freely. Therefore, it is necessary to acquire control commands and a user\u2019s position on a real-time basis. We suggest a new sensor fusion system to achieve this objective and we will call this sensor the \u201cintelligent lead\u201d. The objective of the intelligent lead is to acquire a stable distance from the user to the robot, speed-control volume and turn-control volume, even when the robot platform with the intelligent lead is shaken on uneven ground. In this paper we explain a precise Extended Kalman Filter (EKF) procedure for this. The intelligent lead physically consists of a Kinect sensor, the serial linkage attached with eight rotary encoders, and an IMU (Inertial Measurement Unit) and their measurements are fused by the EKF. A mobile robot was designed to test the performance of the proposed sensor system. After installing the intelligent lead in the mobile robot, several tests are conducted to verify that the mobile robot with the intelligent lead is capable of achieving its goal points while maintaining the appropriate distance between the robot and the user. The results show that we can use the intelligent lead proposed in this paper as a new HRI sensor joined a joystick and a distance measure in the mobile environments such as the robot and the user are moving at the same time.<\/jats:p>","DOI":"10.3390\/s120608301","type":"journal-article","created":{"date-parts":[[2012,6,14]],"date-time":"2012-06-14T11:25:10Z","timestamp":1339673110000},"page":"8301-8318","update-policy":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.3390\/mdpi_crossmark_policy","source":"Crossref","is-referenced-by-count":25,"title":["Intelligent Lead: A Novel HRI Sensor for Guide Robots"],"prefix":"10.3390","volume":"12","author":[{"given":"Keum-Bae","family":"Cho","sequence":"first","affiliation":[{"name":"Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, Seoul National University, 1 Gwanak-ro, Gwanak-gu, Seoul 151-742, Korea"}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]},{"given":"Beom-Hee","family":"Lee","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, Seoul National University, 1 Gwanak-ro, Gwanak-gu, Seoul 151-742, Korea"}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]}],"member":"1968","published-online":{"date-parts":[[2012,6,14]]},"reference":[{"key":"ref_1","unstructured":"World Health Organization Media Centre, Visual impairment and blindness. Available online: http:\/\/www.who.int\/mediacentre\/factsheets\/fs282\/en\/ (accessed on 20 March 2012)."},{"key":"ref_2","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Kulyukin, V., Gharpure, C., and Nicholson, J. (2005, January 2\u20136). RoboCart: Toward Robot-Assisted Navigation of Grocery Stores by the Visually Impaired. Edmonton, Canada.","DOI":"10.1109\/IROS.2005.1545107"},{"key":"ref_3","unstructured":"Kulyukin, V., Gharpure, C., Nicholson, J., and Pavithran, S. (October, January 28). RFID in Robot-Assisted Indoor Navigation for the Visually Impaired. Sendai, Japan."},{"key":"ref_4","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Pradeep, V., Medioni, G., and Weiland, J. (2010, January 13\u201318). Robot Vision for the Visually Impaired. San Francisco, CA, USA.","DOI":"10.1109\/CVPRW.2010.5543579"},{"key":"ref_5","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Hesch, J.A., Mirzaei, F.M., Mariottini, G.L., and Roumeliotis, S.I. (2009, January 11\u201315). A 3D Pose Estimator for the Visually Impaired. St. Louis, MI, USA.","DOI":"10.1109\/IROS.2009.5354060"},{"key":"ref_6","unstructured":"Ulrich, I., and Borenstein, J. (1997, January 21\u201327). The GuideCane\u2014A Computerized Travel Aid for the Active Guidance of Blind Pedestrians. Albuquerque, NM, USA."},{"key":"ref_7","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"131","DOI":"10.1109\/3468.911370","article-title":"The GuideCane\u2014Applying mobile robot technologies to assist the visually impaired","volume":"31","author":"Ulrich","year":"2001","journal-title":"Proc. IEEE Trans. Syst. Man Cybern. Part A"},{"key":"ref_8","first-page":"398","article-title":"A human robot interactive system\u2014RoJi","volume":"2","author":"Shim","year":"2004","journal-title":"Int. J. Control Autom. Syst."},{"key":"ref_9","unstructured":"Melvin, A.A., Prabu, B., Nagarajan, R., and Illias, B. (2009, January 11\u201313). ROVI: A Robot for Visually Impaired for Collision-Free Navigation. Penang, Malaysia."},{"key":"ref_10","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Galatas, G., McMurrough, C., Mariottini, G.L., and Makedon, F. (2011, January 25\u201327). eyeDog: An Assistive-Guide Robot for the Visually Impaired. Crete, Greece.","DOI":"10.1145\/2141622.2141691"},{"key":"ref_11","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Se, S., Lowe, D., and Little, J. (2001, January 21\u201326). Vision-based Mobile Robot Localization And Mapping Using Scale-Invariant Features. Seoul, Korea.","DOI":"10.1177\/027836402128964611"},{"key":"ref_12","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"3162","DOI":"10.3390\/s120303162","article-title":"Monocular camera\/IMU\/GNSS integration for ground vehicle navigation in challenging GNSS environments","volume":"12","author":"Chu","year":"2012","journal-title":"Sensors"},{"key":"ref_13","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"615","DOI":"10.1109\/70.880813","article-title":"New Potential Functions for Mobile Robot Path Planning","volume":"16","author":"Ge","year":"2000","journal-title":"IEEE Trans. Rob. Autom."},{"key":"ref_14","unstructured":"Ulrich, I., and Borenstein, J. (1998, January 18\u201321). VFH+: Reliable Obstacle Avoidance for Fast Mobile Robots. Leuven, Belgium."},{"key":"ref_15","unstructured":"Ringdahl, O. (2003). Path Tracking and Obstacle Avoidance Algorithms for Autonomous Forest Machines. [Master Thesis, Umea University]."}],"container-title":["Sensors"],"original-title":[],"language":"en","link":[{"URL":"https:\/\/www.mdpi.com\/1424-8220\/12\/6\/8301\/pdf","content-type":"unspecified","content-version":"vor","intended-application":"similarity-checking"}],"deposited":{"date-parts":[[2025,10,11]],"date-time":"2025-10-11T21:50:47Z","timestamp":1760219447000},"score":1,"resource":{"primary":{"URL":"https:\/\/www.mdpi.com\/1424-8220\/12\/6\/8301"}},"subtitle":[],"short-title":[],"issued":{"date-parts":[[2012,6,14]]},"references-count":15,"journal-issue":{"issue":"6","published-online":{"date-parts":[[2012,6]]}},"alternative-id":["s120608301"],"URL":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.3390\/s120608301","relation":{},"ISSN":["1424-8220"],"issn-type":[{"type":"electronic","value":"1424-8220"}],"subject":[],"published":{"date-parts":[[2012,6,14]]}}}