身障人士的日常生活需求(如:飲食、溝通…等)與一般人相同，他們亦渴望能獨立生活，為了達成這個目的，他們需要獨自完成日常生活中重複的例行事務。手臂無法活動或是手部動作有所限制的身障人士，往往無法自行進食而須仰賴家人或朋友的幫忙，進食對於此類身障者及其家人成為一項耗時且沉重的負擔。餵食輔助系統提供了一種減輕此負擔的方式，各式輔助身障人士的餵食系統陸續發展中，每種系統皆有其特點與限制。
本論文將介紹一套新開發的餵食機器人系統，此餵食機器人擁有十個自由度的機械手臂、可調整置入餐盤大小的LED選菜盤、紅外線感測器、吹氣開關以及下巴控制搖桿。此餵食機器人具有自動臉部追蹤的功能，即使使用者在餵食過程中有小範圍的頭部位置移動，機械手臂亦能自動調整湯匙位置將食物移至使用者嘴前，臉部追蹤功能的實作是藉由紅外線感測器而非傳統採用攝影機的方式。在自動模式下，使用者藉由吹氣開關選擇選菜盤中餐盤內的食物，而在半自動模式下，除了自動模式的方便，使用者還可藉由下巴操作搖桿微調湯匙位置來享用美食。此外，使用者可隨時藉由吹氣讓機器手臂退回至安全的初始位置。

The needs (e.g. meals, communications, etc.) of disabled persons are essentially the same as the needs of everyone else. Disabled people aspire to live independently. To achieve this goal, they need to be able to carry out some routine and repetitive tasks by themselves. Persons who have limited control of their limbs or insufficient manual dexterity are unable to enjoy meals by themselves. They usually need their family members or friends to help them to eat meals. Eating meals becomes a tedious and heavy burden for the disabled persons and their families. A meal assistance system offers an opportunity to lessen this kind of burden. A number of meal assistance systems have been developed for disabled people. Each one has its own advantages and limitations. In this thesis, a meal assistance robot is introduced. The meal assistance robot consists of a manipulator arm with 10 degrees of freedom, an adjustable food frame with LEDs, Infra-red detectors, a puffing switch, a joystick. The meal assistance robot has the automatic face tracking functionality which allows the robot to automatically adjust its manipulator arm to place the food to the users’ mouths even if they move a little bit during the meal feeding procedure. The functionality of face tracking is implemented by the use of infra-red detectors instead of a camera. There are two operating modes in the meal assistance robot. In the autonomy mode, the user can use the puffing switch to select the food on the food tray constrained by the food frame and the robot will sequentially feed the user with the chosen food. In the semi-autonomy mode, in addition to the convenience of automatic mode, the user also can use his or her jaw to control the joystick to adjust the spoon position and enjoy the meal. Furthermore, the user can reset the manipulator arm to the safe position at any time whenever he or she blows the puffing switch.

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