Hardware-Free Robotics Laboratories in Mixed Reality

2026-09-16

AI Summary

"This study addresses the limitations of traditional robotics education, which heavily relies on screen-based simulations and lacks practical experience in real-world environments. To tackle this issue, the project introduces MR-Robotics LAB, a mixed reality platform that facilitates the generation of trajectories via MATLAB and their realistic-scale reproduction on the Meta Quest 3, complete with collision detection and grasping functionalities. The platform leverages MATLAB, JSON, and Unity for data exchange and visualization, offering a seamless transition from simulation to mixed reality. Preliminary evaluations indicate that students find the setup easy to use and helpful for understanding workspace concepts, with an average rating of 4.56 out of 5, and 83% of them expressing willingness to utilize the platform in introductory courses."

Abstract

Teaching robotics relies on screen-based simulation, showing robot motion in an abstract coordinate frame rather than at real scale in the learner's own space, while access to physical hardware is limited by cost, safety, and scheduling constraints. We present MR-Robotics LAB, a mixed-reality (MR) platform that replays MATLAB-generated robot trajectories at real scale within the learner's physical environment. A browser-based service validates a MATLAB workspace file (.mat), normalizes units, and publishes a versioned JSON trajectory; a Unity application on a Meta Quest 3 then reproduces the authored joint configurations under position control and replays them at the declared frame rate within a physics-enabled scene that supports collision detection and end-effector grasping. A formative single-group evaluation with engineering students found that participants reported low setup effort (M = 4.67 on a 5-point scale) and perceived support for workspace understanding from multi-viewpoint inspection (M = 4.56), and 83% of participants affirmed their willingness to use the platform in an introductory robotics course. The evaluation instrument records only perceived outcomes, without counterbalancing or a learning measure, so no comparative advantage over desktop simulation is claimed. The contribution is a reusable simulation-to-MR trajectory pathway and design guidance for hardware-free robot visualization in engineering education.

Problem

• Robotics Education
• Mixed Reality
• Simulation
• Physical Hardware Access

Innovation

• Mixed Reality
• MATLAB Trajectories
• Physics-Enabled Scene
• Hardware-Free Visualization
• Robotics Education