With social distancing norms becoming compulsory to contain the COVID-19 pandemic, the Autonomous Ground Vehicle (AGV) research group at IIT Kharagpur has developed a low-cost Artificial Intelligence (AI)-based cyber-physical system to monitor social distance in public places.
The device, developed by the group under the Centre of Excellence for Robotics Research, can visually detect the gap between individuals and play a proximity alert sound through audio output after any violation of norms. It uses images in the field view of a camera and computes the distance as per the criterion set by the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare.
The device was engineered during lockdown by Professors Debashish Chakravarty and Aditya Bandopadhyay with the help of readily-available hardware. The group also worked with experts from other areas, including Professors Siddhartha Mukhopadhyay, Surjya K Pal and Samir K Pal.
In a statement, the researchers said their objective was to ensure not just a design but also the device's manufacture. "We further focused on the ease of deployment even in remote locales and curtailing the cost by using
inexpensive and easily accessible hardware stack,” they added.
The device has been successfully tested with installations of three prototypes at a marketplace inside the IIT Kharagpur campus.
Commending the team, IIT-K Director VK Tewari said, "While we are working on national mission projects related to COVID-19 healthcare, we are simultaneously working on frugal innovations to cater to the immediate needs at our campus in particular and the country in general, keeping in mind cost and product delivery period."
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