Paloma de la Puente ^1* Markus Vincze ² Diego Guffanti ³ Daniel Galan ¹

• ¹ Universidad Politecnica de Madrid, Madrid, Spain
• ² Vienna University of Technology, Vienna, Vienna, Austria
• ³ Universidad UTE, Quito, Ecuador

In Choi et al. (2024), the main trends in assistive technologies for healthcare and home environments were analyzed. In that study, assistive technologies were classified into three major groups: physical aid or mobility devices, sensor and monitoring systems, and assistive robots. In an ageing society, with people living longer and a lack of medical personnel, there is undoubtedly a growing interest in the development and commercialization of robotic systems that are able to provide support at healthcare facilities and home environments Bajones et al. (2018); Keroglou et al. (2023); Silvera-Tawil (2024). At healthcare facilities, robots improve the diagnosis and treatment of many different diseases (mental and physical) and they help professional staff be more efficient, with more time for patients. At home, they assist to prevent accidents, they have the potential to perform different household tasks, keep the users active with cognitive and physical activities, and raise alarms if needed. Assistive robots designed for therapeutic purposes have proven useful in reducing agitation of elderly people and stress of caregivers Kolstad et al. (2020).One major challenge is the robustness and reliability of these robotic systems, which involve complex technologies and software, and usually operate in highly unpredictable environments Bajones et al. (2018). All these topics are of course interconnected, since advances in one direction may reveal and help address other kinds of issues Bajones et al. (2018). This Frontiers Research Topic aims at compiling a general overview of ongoing work and recent results in these areas, specifically targeted to solve open problems for assistive and service robots in health and home applications. that the presented methodology is better than state-of-the-art multihypothesis methods, mainly in terms 31 of particle quality and location estimation. Accurate self-localization is achieved even in complex and 32 dynamic situations. This approach shows a high recovery rate after intentional position perturbations, 33 highlighting its reliability in indoor navigation. Being able to determine its own position for navigation to known places is a key aspect for many 35 functionalities such as transportation of different items or for cleaning tasks. However, other activities 36 involved in support for daily living require proper detection and communication with the user. Hence, 37 another topic of high relevance for this kind of service robots is the interaction between the human and the 38 robot. In many cases, a successful interaction requires reliable human pose estimation algorithms. Tang This approach seems very promising for difficult tasks in domestic settings and could be used as a basis 61 to handle irregular objects in the presence of complicated occlusions or with a limited field of view. Other significant challenges for health and home robots come from the integration of components towards 68 advanced systems that provide a variety of functionalities to support the users. The work by Mora et 69 al. describes the ADAM robot, designed to assist elderly people by performing household tasks such as 70 cleaning and picking up objects. This setup contributes to improving the autonomy of older people in 71 the home. ADAM, equipped with a manipulation system consisting of two robotic arms and autonomous 72 navigation, also learns from human interactions. This work contributes significantly to social robotics 73 by integrating physical assistance functions with social interaction capabilities, reducing loneliness, and 74 providing better care for older people, enhancing their independence and well-being. From robot localization and human pose estimation to grasping, mental and physical HRI and integrated 88 robotic devices for more advanced support, novel ideas are presented and evaluated. From the topic contributions, we would like to highlight some key areas for ongoing research. In mobile 90 robots navigation for domestic environments, achieving more accurate localization in long and large 91 symmetric spaces, and the ability to relocalize, are important capabilities that will attract more attention. In this field, and also related to HRI, there is a current trend towards the integration and exploitation of Future work should also focus on more empirical testing with real users in real environments, both 96 for individual functionalities and for multi-purpose robots and assistive devices. The benefits of shared 97 control for performing difficult tasks should also be further studied, integrated and evaluated. The ethical 98 implications of the development and adoption of assistive and medical robots should be further studied.