2026-10-12T06:44:29Z https://api.figshare.com/v2/oai

oai:figshare.com:article/33826687 2026-09-16T06:25:00Z portal_1104 item_type_2 month_year_09_2026

Will android astronomers dream of electric stars? An experiment in collaborative astronomical visual data exploration with a humanoid robot Christopher Fluke (18925279) John McCormick (18926713) Michelle Cluver (18924847) Brian Brady (18913822) Astronomical data analysis Collaborative visual data exploration Humanoid robots Human-robot collaboration Scientific sensemaking <p dir="ltr">Astronomy is in an era of data-driven discovery, where much of the information collected and generated will never be examined directly by human researchers. As a component of data exploration and discovery, artificial intelligence is changing the way we think about scientific collaboration; however, work to date has almost exclusively considered non-embodied algorithms running on a computer. In this work, we report on an experimental study involving a visual data exploration activity, mediated via a large-format display, where a humanoid robot shares the physical environment with humans. Throughout, we used role-playing and reflective practices to characterise and compare human--human collaborative visual discovery processes with those arising between humans and robots. Across three sessions, we moved from familiarisation with a Unitree G1 humanoid robot to working alongside a new sensemaking collaborator, Roci. While Roci's ontological agency was low, requiring teleoperation throughout for locomotion and gesturing, his phenomenological agency was high: we accepted Roci as a collaborator whose actions were perceived as intentional. Our study highlights four complementary roles for humanoid robots in visual data exploration: (1) the Assistant, responding to requests for information or to perform research activities; (2) the Educator, patiently explaining and demonstrating to a novice how to complete a visual exploration task; (3) the Proxy, standing in for an absent collaborator to provide continuity in the data exploration process; and (4) the Collaborator, where the robot attains equal status in a human-robot team, performing discovery tasks and contributing to the development of knowledge. As humanoid robots continue to become more accessible and affordable, we see a pathway for robots to start to play a range of roles in astronomy that were not envisaged previously. The future of human-robot collaborative visual data exploration in astronomy starts here.</p> 2026-09-16T00:00:00Z Dataset Media 10.25916/sut.33826687.v1 https://figshare.com/articles/media/Will_android_astronomers_dream_of_electric_stars_An_experiment_in_collaborative_astronomical_visual_data_exploration_with_a_humanoid_robot/33826687 CC BY-NC-ND 4.0