Building dependable assistive robots that support patients, clinicians, and carers — bringing intelligent automation to where it matters most: human health.
What We Do
The Healthcare team — the founding heart of RoboNotts — develops assistive robotic systems designed for real clinical and care environments. Our robot, Happy, has competed on the world stage at ICRA and HEART-MET, benchmarked against international teams in physically assistive robotics.
Happy is built to support patients with reduced mobility: navigating hospital ward environments autonomously, assisting with object manipulation tasks, and interacting safely with human occupants through natural gesture and voice-based communication.
We combine manipulation, navigation, and human-robot interaction in a single cohesive system — and we rigorously test it against real-world benchmarks, not just lab conditions. Our work directly builds on the University of Nottingham's strengths in healthcare technology research.
Robotic manipulation systems enabling Happy to fetch, carry, and interact with everyday objects — supporting patients who have limited upper-body mobility.
Autonomous navigation in dynamic indoor environments, safely operating around patients, staff, and furniture without pre-mapped routes.
Natural interaction through facial recognition, gesture detection, and voice commands — ensuring Happy can be used by anyone, not just technical operators.
Competed at ICRA 2023 and HEART-MET 2022, validating our system against the world's leading student and academic robotics groups.
Competition History
Physically Assistive Robot Challenge at the International Conference on Robotics and Automation. May 29 – June 1, 2023.
Healthcare Robotics Technologies Competition. October 2–5, 2022. Our first international competition appearance with Happy.
The People
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