“Pioneer in Portugal, the project of affective robotics was born in 2009 and already has positive results: the children who interacted with the robot acquired the competence to recognise emotions.
Robotics-Autism is the name of the research, led by Filomena Soares, professor at the Department of Industrial Electronics (DEI) and researcher at the ALGORITMI Research Centre, which uses the humanoid robot Zeca in the mediation between a human-partner and children with autism spectrum disorder. “Zeca has the special feature. Its face is made of a special polymer that closely resembles human skin. The robot is programmed here at the University, to simulate emotions: being sad, happy, scared and angry.”
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