The introduction of industrial robots to work with human workers has led to the paradigm of human-robot teams (HRTs) collaboration in industrial settings. HRTs change the way humans interact and cooperate with their neighbors in the factory and promise to realize the potential of each team member regarding their distinct abilities. For example, human workers are efficient in highly varied tasks and adaptive to changes, while robots are more precise and faster with repetitive tasks. Therefore, the deployment of HRTs in manufacturing operations combines efficiency and flexibility and can reduce production lead time and improve product quality. However, the deployment of HRTs in manufacturing operations also brings challenges, for example, how to improve manufacturing efficiency while enhancing well-being? Specifically, we are interested in exploring the following aspects:
- How can human and robot roles be optimized to complement each other’s strengths in manufacturing tasks?
- What strategies can be implemented to ensure ergonomic and psychological safety for human workers in a collaborative manufacturing environment?
- How to enable robots to understand human operators’ intentions and learn from them to enhance collaborative manufacturing over time?