# Virtual Barriers in Augmented Reality for Safe and Effective Human-Robot Cooperation in Manufacturing

arXiv: https://arxiv.org/abs/2104.05211 · HTML: https://mlsanity.com/paper/2104.05211/

## Key facts

- Cited by 2 papers in the map (data through 14 Oct 2026).
- First posted on arXiv 12 Apr 2021.

## Built on by (most cited first, 2 of 2)

- [Augmented Reality and Robotics: A Survey and Taxonomy for AR-enhanced Human-Robot Interaction and Robotic Interfaces](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2203.03254/) (2022)
- [Extended Reality for Enhanced Human-Robot Collaboration: a Human-in-the-Loop Approach](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2403.14597/) (2024)

## Abstract (arXiv)

Safety is a fundamental requirement in any human-robot collaboration scenario. To ensure the safety of users for such scenarios, we propose a novel Virtual Barrier system facilitated by an augmented reality interface. Our system provides two kinds of Virtual Barriers to ensure safety: 1) a Virtual Person Barrier which encapsulates and follows the user to protect them from colliding with the robot, and 2) Virtual Obstacle Barriers which users can spawn to protect objects or regions that the robot should not enter. To enable effective human-robot collaboration, our system includes an intuitive robot programming interface utilizing speech commands and hand gestures, and features the capability of automatic path re-planning when potential collisions are detected as a result of a barrier intersecting the robot's planned path. We compared our novel system with a standard 2D display interface through a user study, where participants performed a task mimicking an industrial manufacturing procedure. Results show that our system increases the user's sense of safety and task efficiency, and makes the interaction more intuitive.