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As robots become more advanced and capable, developing trust is an important factor of human-robot interaction and cooperation. However, as multiple environmental and social factors can influence trust, it is important to develop more elaborate scenarios and methods to measure human-robot trust. A widely used measurement of trust in social science is the investment game . In this study, we propose a scaled-up, immersive, science fiction Human-Robot Interaction (HRI) scenario for intrinsic motivation on human-robot collaboration, built upon the investment game and aimed at adapting the investment game for human-robot trust. For this purpose, we utilize two Neuro-Inspired COmpanion (NICO) - robots and a projected scenery. We investigate the applicability of our space mission experiment design to measure trust and the impact of non-verbal communication. We observe a correlation of 0.43 ( p = 0.02 ) between self-assessed trust and trust measured from the game, and a positive impact of non-verbal communication on trust ( p = 0.0008 ) and robot perception for anthropomorphism ( p = 0.007 ) and animacy ( p = 0.00002 ). We conclude that our scenario is an appropriate method to measure trust in human-robot interaction and also to study how non-verbal communication influences a human's trust in robots., Competing Interests: The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest., (Copyright © 2021 Zörner, Arts, Vasiljevic, Srivastava, Schmalzl, Mir, Bhatia, Strahl, Peters, Alpay and Wermter.)

To overcome novel challenges in complex domestic environments, humanoid robots can learn from human teachers. We propose that the capability for social interaction should be a key factor in this teaching process and benefits both the subjective experience of the human user and the learning process itself. To support our hypothesis, we present a Human-Robot Interaction study on human-assisted visuomotor learning with the robot NICO, the Neuro-Inspired COmpanion, a child-sized humanoid. NICO is a flexible, social platform with sensing and manipulation abilities. We give a detailed description of NICO's design and a comprehensive overview of studies that use or evaluate NICO. To engage in social interaction, NICO can express stylized facial expressions and utter speech via an Embodied Dialogue System. NICO is characterized in particular by combining these social interaction capabilities with the abilities for human-like object manipulation and crossmodal perception. In the presented study, NICO acquires visuomotor grasping skills by interacting with its environment. In contrast to methods like motor babbling, the learning process is, in part, supported by a human teacher. To begin the learning process, an object is placed into NICO's hand, and if this object is accidentally dropped, the human assistant has to recover it. The study is conducted with 24 participants with little or no prior experience with robots. In the robot-guided experimental condition, assistance is actively requested by NICO via the Embodied Dialogue System. In the human-guided condition, instructions are given by a human experimenter, while NICO remains silent. Evaluation using established questionnaires like Godspeed, Mind Perception, and Uncanny Valley Indices, along with a structured interview and video analysis of the interaction, show that the robot's active requests for assistance foster the participant's engagement and benefit the learning process. This result supports the hypothesis that the ability for social interaction is a key factor for companion robots that learn with the help of non-expert teachers, as these robots become capable of communicating active requests or questions that are vital to their learning process. We also show how the design of NICO both enables and is driven by this approach., (Copyright © 2020 Kerzel, Pekarek-Rosin, Strahl, Heinrich and Wermter.)

Fluorescent acid-fast microscopy (FAM) was used to enumerate intracellular Mycobacterium avium, Mycobacterium intracellulare, and Mycobacterium scrofulaceum in the ciliated phagocytic protozoan Tetrahymena pyriformis. There was a linear relationship between FAM and colony counts of M. avium cells both from cultures and within protozoa. The Ziehl-Neelsen acid-fast stain could not be used to enumerate intracellular mycobacteria because uninfected protozoa contained acid-fast, bacterium-like particles. Starved, 7-day-old cultures of T. pyriformis transferred into fresh medium readily phagocytized M. avium, M. intracellulare, and M. scrofulaceum. Phagocytosis was rapid and reached a maximum in 30 min. M. avium, M. intracellulare, and M. scrofulaceum grew within T. pyriformis, increasing by factors of 4- to 40-fold after 5 days at 30 degrees C. Intracellular M. avium numbers remained constant over a 25-day period of growth (by transfer) of T. pyriformis. Intracellular M. avium cells also survived protozoan encystment and germination. The growth and viability of T. pyriformis were not affected by mycobacterial infection. The results suggest that free-living phagocytic protozoa may be natural hosts and reservoirs for M. avium, M. intracellulare, and M. scrofulaceum.