Robots at Work: NIOSH’s Center for Occupational Robotics Research

Robots began appearing in workplaces in the 1980s, and the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH), part of CDC, studied their safety extensively then. But those robots worked in isolation, in cages or cells away from people. Today's robots increasingly work alongside workers, are worn by them, or move among them. To keep up, NIOSH created the Center for Occupational Robotics Research in September 2017, to protect people who use, wear or work near robots.

Image from CDC's page on the Center for Occupational Robotics Research.

The robots it studies

What it does

With partners, the Center works to:

• monitor trends in robot-related injuries;
• evaluate robotic technologies both as sources of workplace injury and illness and as ways to prevent them;
• build risk profiles of robotic workplaces;
• identify research needs and carry out research on the safety, health and well-being of people working with robots;
• support consensus safety standards;
• develop best practices, guidance and training for safe human–robot interaction.

What it has done

• An alliance, since 2017, with the Association for Advancing Automation (A3) and the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) to raise awareness of robot hazards, promote practices that control mechanical, electrical and other hazards of working with robotic systems, and help produce educational resources such as fact sheets.
• Research funding: with the National Robotics Initiative, NIOSH added worker safety to a multi-agency funding announcement. NIOSH funded two grants, and the National Science Foundation and other agencies funded more.
• University partnerships for collaborative research and student training.

What's next

• Publish research on using robots to prevent work-related injuries.
• Work with employers to build risk profiles for robotics applications.
• Contribute to updated American National Standards Institute/Robotics Industry Association standards on robot safety.

The Center's work supports the NIOSH Strategic Plan for fiscal years 2019–2026, including its goals to reduce musculoskeletal disorders and traumatic injuries and to promote safe, healthy work design. Other partners include the Advanced Robotics for Manufacturing Institute, the National Institute of Standards and Technology, the Networking and Information Technology Research and Development Program, and the National Safety Council's Work to Zero initiative. More is on the NIOSH robotics topic page.

Sources

Based on "Center for Occupational Robotics Research," National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (November 25, 2024); a work of the United States government in the public domain.