Development of Cyber-Physical Speech-Controlled Wheelchair for Disabled Persons

The three-stage development of a cyber-physical speech-controlled wheelchair for disabled persons is described. Initially, a small prototype was built to test the feasibility of using cloud-based speech recognition systems for real-time wheelchair maneuvering. In the second stage, the full-sized prototype was built and tested in a laboratory and in a clinical environment. In the third stage, the full-scale prototype was equipped with distance sensors and an advanced control algorithm for semi-autonomous drive. The system architecture is described with the important addition of edge computing for speech recognition. Six cloud speech recognition services and two offline services were used, as using multiple speech recognition systems improves system reliability and latency. The software and hardware technologies are described, in addition to an innovative application of multiple cloud/edge systems for wheelchair motion control.