Haruo Takemura

Osaka University | Handai · Graduate School of Information Science and Technology

Cloud computing has become essential for Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) due to its high availability, scalability, and support for virtual learning environments. The COVID-19 pandemic further accelerated this trend, prompting HEIs to transition their learning environments to the cloud. Consequently, this rapid shift has introduced post-adopti...

Autonomous manipulation in robot arms is a complex and evolving field of study in robotics. This paper introduces an innovative approach to this challenge by focusing on imitation learning (IL). In contrast to traditional imitation methods, our approach uses IL based on bilateral control, allowing for more precise and adaptable robot movements. Con...

Autonomous manipulation in robot arms is a complex and evolving field of study in robotics. This paper introduces an innovative approach to this challenge by focusing on imitation learning (IL). Unlike traditional imitation methods, our approach uses IL based on bilateral control, allowing for more precise and adaptable robot movements. The convent...

Image-to-image translation methods have progressed from only considering the image-level information to integrating the global- and instance-level information. However, only the foreground instances are refined, and the background semantics are taken as an entire feature, which causes a substantial loss of the semantic information in the translatio...

Virtual reality (VR) video games that are played on a VR headset are becoming increasingly common in households, and though many games require players to navigate vast virtual spaces, most homes cannot provide a large enough physical space to encompass the entire virtual space. Thus, VR video games that require locomotion often provide users with a...

This paper presents the intermediate results of our Mixed Reality (MR)-based visualisation prototype for teaching assistants (TAs) to support collaborative learning. Many universities have introduced TA programs; however, it is not easy for TAs to understand students’ engagement states in collaborative learning activities due to their lack of teach...

In this paper, we propose the design and implementation of spherical magnetic joint (SMJ)-based gait generation for the inverted locomotion of multi-legged robots. A spherical permanent magnet was selected to generate a consistent attractive force, enabling the robot to perform inverted locomotion under steel structures. Additionally, the robot’s f...

Cloud Computing is becoming an integral part of higher education institutions (HEIs) due to the proven benefits of high availability and the fast provisioning of IT services. This paper presents an exploratory study based on the Technology-Organization-Environment (TOE) framework conducted in the Dominican Republic regarding the adoption status and...

Introduction Developing approaches for early detection of possible risk clusters for mental health problems among undergraduate university students is warranted to reduce the duration of untreated illness (DUI). However, little is known about indicators of need for care by others. Herein, we aimed to clarify the specific value of study engagement a...

This study explores significant eye-gaze features that can be used to estimate subjective difficulty while reading educational comics. Educational comics have grown rapidly as a promising way to teach difficult topics using illustrations and texts. However, comics include a variety of information on one page, so automatically detecting learners' st...

The field of learning analytics (LA) is growing as a valuable solution for higher education institutions to understand students’ learning processes and improve the quality of education. However, even with proven benefits, there has been a slow adoption of learning analytics, particularly in Latin American (LATAM) countries when compared to other re...

Despite remarkable recent progress in image translation, the complex scene with multiple discrepant objects remains a challenging problem. Because the translated images have low fidelity and tiny objects in fewer details and obtain unsatisfactory performance in object recognition. Without the thorough object perception (i.e., bounding boxes, catego...

This study aimed to clarify the adaptation features of University students exposed to fully online education during the novel coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic and to identify accompanying mental health problems and predictors of school adaptation. The pandemic has forced many universities to transition rapidly to delivering online educa...

Water is an essential substance for humans in their daily lives. There are many opportunities for us to come in contact with water, such as cooking, bathing, and swimming. However, few studies have reproduced the sensation of water touching the skin. This study aims to propose a novel midair haptic device, named FlowHaptics, that reproduces the fee...

Learners are expected to stay wakeful and focused while interacting with e-learning platforms. Although wakefulness of learners strongly relates to educational outcomes, detecting drowsy learning behaviors only from log data is not an easy task. In this study, we describe the results of our research to model learners’ wakefulness based on multimoda...

In this paper, we present a spherical magnetic joint for the inverted locomotion of a multi-legged robot. The permanent magnet's spherical shape allows the robot to attach its foot to a steel surface without energy consumption. However, the robot's inverted locomotion requires foot flexibility for placement and gait construction of the robot. There...

Firefighters need to gain information from both inside and outside of buildings in first response emergency scenarios. For this purpose, drones are beneficial. This paper presents an elicitation study that showed firefighters’ desires to collaborate with autonomous drones. We developed a Human–Drone interaction (HDI) method for indicating a target...

Firefighters need to gain information from both inside and outside of buildings in first response emergency scenarios. For this purpose, drones are beneficial. This paper presents an elicitation study that showed the firefighters' desire to collaborate with autonomous drones. We developed a Human-Drone Interaction (HDI) method for indicating a targ...

Firefighters need to gain information from both inside and outside of buildings in first response emergency scenarios. For this purpose, drones are beneficial. This paper presents an elicitation study that showed the firefighters’ desire to collaborate with autonomous drones. We developed a Human-Drone Interaction (HDI) method for indicating a targ...

This paper focuses on exploring the optimal gesture interface for Human-Drone Interaction in a firefighting scenario. For this purpose, we conducted a Preliminary Interview and User Study with seven subjects from the Kobe Firefighting Brigade, Japan. As a drone’s flight and locomotion properties significantly affect the user’s mental and physical e...

Observing rapid movements, such as the key moments needed to correctly judge fouls in sports, is a challenging task for referees. Though assistive technology like 2D slow-motion replays exist, users are still limited by the viewing angle and degree of interaction with these videos. In this paper, we propose an interactive 3D vision augmentation fra...

In exhibition settings such as art galleries or museums, Augmented Reality (AR) has the potential to provide detailed information about exhibits. While most existing systems provide only general information overlaid on top of the arts, our AR guide system aims to explain multi-section detailed information hidden in the painting. In this paper, we p...

Packing optimization is a challenging and time-consuming task for a number of industry and logistics applications. Efficient packing can reduce the cost of storage and shipping and also guarantee that damage will not occur during shipping. To help address this problem, we propose a spatial augmented reality-based support system for assisting worker...

大阪大学では、初年次必修の全学共通教育科目の一般情報教育科目においてカリキュラム改革を行なった。対面 授業とオンライン授業を組み合わせたターム科目として開講される本授業の開講形態を活用し、ビデオ講義中心のオンライン授業と演習ベースの対面授業を組み合わせた反転学習的アプローチによる授業を開発した。本稿では、開発した授業の概要および授業の運用方法、さらに毎授業後に収集したアンケートの結果について報告する。

Augmented Reality (AR) has become a popular technology in museums, and many venues now provide AR applications inside gallery spaces. To improve museum tour experiences, we have developed an embodied agent AR guide system that aims to explain multi-section detailed information hidden in the painting. In this paper, we investigate the effect of diff...

本稿では，一般情報教育科目において実施した反転授業の実践の概要について報告する．大阪大学において大学1 年生を対象に開講した一般情報教育科目では，講義ビデオによる\e-Learning 授業" と，実習活動による知識の定着をはかる授業を交互に実施する形態で実施した．本研究は，著者らが開発した学習ツールを本科目の授業スタイルに適用することにより，反転学習的アプローチによる一般情報教育の学習効果を明らかにしようとするものである．本稿では，「情報のディジタル化」に関する理解を目的としたモデル授業の概要と，授業で活用した実習用ツールの技術的概要について述べるとともに，実際の授業実践による結果について考察する．

Gestures are used naturally in communication, and use with modern computer systems is becoming increasingly feasible and applicable for interaction. Analyzing how gesture interfaces are perceived in different parts of the world can help in understanding possible weak and strong points, allowing for different improvements to the interfaces. This stu...

With the increase in the number of blended courses in higher education over the past few years, it is now increasingly important to assure the quality of online education by evaluating blended (or hybrid) courses from various aspects such as consistency of learning objectives with assessment, learning materials and technology used, and pedagogical...

Drone navigation in complex environments poses many problems to teleoperators. Especially in three dimensional (3D) structures such as buildings or tunnels, viewpoints are often limited to the drone’s current camera view, nearby objects can be collision hazards, and frequent occlusion can hinder accurate manipulation. To address these issues, we ha...

This paper presents the concept of an unconstrained haptic display; an encountered-type haptic device with unlimited working space in mid-air. Our prototype system utilizes a micro aerial vehicle with an on-board localization system and a flat surface hanging under a quadrotor. Based on an integrated visual sensing system, the device is able to loc...

In the world that we live in now, exclusion is becoming legally permissible, and technology has the power to resist by making bridges and surpassing the offline borders in the online, borderless environment. In this presentation, I will share my visa story and the details of my UK visa denials which eventually banned me from attending EUROCALL2017....

Accurate camera localization is an essential part of tracking systems. However, localization results are greatly affected by illumination. Including data collected under various lighting conditions can improve the robustness of the localization algorithm to lighting variation. However, this is very tedious and time consuming. By using synthesized i...

Accurate camera localization is an essential part of tracking systems. However, localization results are greatly affected by illumination. Including data collected under various lighting conditions can improve the robustness of the localization algorithm to lighting variation. However, this is very tedious and time consuming. By using synthesized i...

In recent years, universities in Japan have made efforts to respond to the urgent call for internationalization of education by reforming their policies, particularly with regard to English language education. Osaka University as one of the most prominent Japanese institutions of higher education is also moving toward online education to provide fl...

We propose an interactive 4D visualization (3D space with an additional time dimension) for the purpose of understanding rapid motion in dynamic 3D information. With an interactive 4D visualization, the user can not only observe dynamic 3D motion from different viewpoints, but also freely adapt the speed of visualization on each viewpoint. We devel...

Most existing locomotion devices that represent the sensation of walking target a user who is actually performing a walking motion. Here, we attempted to represent the walking sensation, especially a kinesthetic sensation and advancing feeling (the sense of moving forward) while the user remains seated. To represent the walking sensation using a re...

This paper outlines the iterative stages involved in designing and developing a blended course of English for General Academic Purposes (EGAP) at Osaka University. First, the basic Successive Approximation Model (SAM 1) is introduced as the guiding instructional design model upon which the course was created. Afterward, the stages of design and dev...

In recent years, there has been a burgeoning interest in Augmented Reality (AR) technologies, especially in educational settings to edutain (i.e. educate and entertain) students and engage them in their learning. This study reports the results of the use of an AR application called BlippAR to augment poster carousel tasks in a blended English cours...

Assessing learner readiness for online learning is the starting point for online course design. This study thus aimed to evaluate Japanese learners' perceived e-readiness for learning English online prior to designing and developing an online EGAP (English for General Academic Purposes) course at Osaka University. A sample of 299 undergraduate Japa...

We present a human-centered designed social drone aiming to be used in a human crowd environment. Based on design studies and focus groups, we created a prototype of a social drone with a social shape, face and voice for human interaction. We used the prototype for a proxemic study, comparing the required distance from the drone humans could comfor...

Emerging bioimaging technologies enable us to capture various dynamic cellular activities in vivo. As large amounts of data are obtained these days and it is becoming unrealistic to manually process massive number of images, automatic analysis methods are required. One of the issues for automatic image segmentation is that image-taking conditions a...

In recent years, a lot of locomotion devices have been developed. However, most locomotion devices require the user to do a walking motion while the user is standing. In this study, we represented the walking sensation while remaining seated by representing the footsteps sensation using longitudinal friction force on the sole of the foot. We develo...

Drone navigation in complex environments poses many problems to teleoperators. Especially in 3D structures like buildings or tunnels, viewpoints are often limited to the drone's current camera view, nearby objects can be collision hazards, and frequent occlusion can hinder accurate manipulation. To address these issues, we have developed a novel in...

In recent years, virtual and augmented reality have begun to take advantage of the high speed capabilities of data streaming technologies and wireless networks. However, limitations like bandwidth and latency still prevent us from achieving high fidelity telepresence and collaborative virtual and augmented reality applications. Fortunately, both re...

Force feedback in tool-mediated interactions with the environment is important for the successful performance of complex tasks in daily life as well as in specialized fields such as medicine. Most stylus-based haptic devices require either grounding or attachment to the user’s body. Recently, non-grounded haptic devices have attracted a growing int...

In recent years, a non-grounded haptic display that is unconstrained from the ground and the human body has been studied intensively. Route navigation for the visually impaired and escape during an emergency have been considered as applications of such devices because the device should be free in space. However, it is difficult to display the actua...