Israeli company: Avracadbra Robotics develops robots that will help adults with cerebral palsy to rehabilitate

The company is based on algorithms that allow the robot to recognize human emotions, developed by Dr. Marina Fridin, former head of the robotics laboratory at Ariel University; an interview with Fridin and the company's CEO Natasha Shukin, at the Life Sciences Baltics conference

Among the Israeli companies that presented at the Life Science Baltics conference held last week in Vilnius, the capital of Lithuania, was a company whose name alone brought us back to childhood - Avracadbra Robotics. Dr. Marina Fridin, former head of the robotics laboratory at Ariel University presented algorithms that allow the robot to recognize human emotions, which she developed.

In an interview with the scientist website at the Life Sciences Baltics conference, the company's CEO, Natasha Shokin, explains that the possibility of a robot to recognize the emotions of the person sitting in front of him - whether he is happy, sad, thoughtful, focused, etc. according to his hand gestures, body movements, speech, etc. , there is great value in using robots as therapists, coaches, teachers, physical therapists without contact, speech therapy, occupational therapy, professions that they encourage the person, give him the right motivation, manage the therapeutic or educational process, and thereby advance him to the next level. This is especially important when developing robots that will talk to victims of cerebral palsy in the first year after the accident or event that caused it, in order to force them to use it. In the damaged part of their mind, and thus to restore it.

Dr. Pridin, completed a doctorate in computer science and applied mathematics at the Weizmann Institute (with Prof. Tamar Flesh), after which she was offered to open a laboratory in the field of robotics in Ariel. As part of her doctoral thesis, she built algorithms for recognizing human emotions through body gestures, movement, etc. Dr. Friedin explains: "The goal was to give the features to the robot as an input that allows it to understand the mental and emotional state of the person and behave accordingly - Not to be happy when there is a depressed person next to you, and not to be stubborn around stubborn ones. The laboratory at Ariel University dealt in the field known as Social Assistive Robotics, a field that was developed about a decade ago by Prof. Maya Metrick from UCLA. The concept speaks of the fact that in the human world most professions are professions that help people are carried out by guidance, not by physical contact. There is no reason that by building the right models and artificial intelligence it is impossible to give these abilities For a robot. A robot doesn't just have to mop the floor and carry goods off the shelves."

When Dr. Friedin opened the laboratory in Ariel, she studied the behavior of children with cerebral palsy and healthy children in front of them, when they sit in front of a robot that tells them what to do and responds to their words. According to her, there were several cases in which children with cerebral palsy, who suffer from both mental retardation and paralysis , due to damage to large areas of their brain. In the video she presented, she showed how a paralyzed girl moves her hands after the robot He played her the song "Hands up on the head", but she adds that even healthy children were motivated to learn new things that they did not get in the process of conventional teaching.

Shukin: "The work with children with cerebral palsy has received a lot of resonance, so far Fridin has published 19 articles and publications in the scientific press and at conferences. At some point after I conducted very dramatic experiments that showed how the robot can change the worlds of the disabled and the parents of the children asked to keep the robot that improved their condition of the children, but this was not possible because it is laboratory equipment that requires an attached technician."

At the beginning of 2013, Dr. Fridin left the laboratory and founded the start-up company Abrahkadbra Robotics, and appointed Mashukin to manage the business side. "We built a model that would allow adults with cerebral palsy lesions to recover. We also decided that some of the technologies: voice recognition, conversation and speech systems, and computer vision are not developed by ourselves, but purchased off the shelf and integrated.
"The audience we are addressing are adults with cerebral palsy who require long-term rehabilitation. This follows studies that prove that if these patients are provided with an intensive rehabilitation therapeutic process in the first year after the injury, they can fully or almost fully return to their lost abilities, because the neurological pathway in the body is still present .

"Marina's expertise is taking the knowledge of the professionals and turning them into algorithms that guide the robot in its behavior, placing the input from the human behavior on the axis of the algorithms as well as giving a relevant response to the person on the other side and in this way producing in-depth and continuous work.

What stage is the company at now?
Shukin: "We are in the development phase of the concept and design, including principles of planning and modeling of a robotic platform (the robot with which Dr. Friedin worked is suitable in size and shape for child care), detailed planning of libraries for social interaction of robots and humans, and development of scripts for rehabilitation games - with the assistance of the physical therapist, Dr. Mark Delkapotov. We are a ten-month-old startup, we received support from the scientist And we invested money from home and now we are in a round of recruitment and negotiations with incubators."