Robotic Systems for Animal Interaction

Robotic systems for animal interaction form a rapidly advancing interdisciplinary field uniting robotics, artificial intelligence, ethology, and welfare science. These technologies monitor, engage with, and assist animals across settings such as precision livestock farming, wildlife conservation, and laboratory research. Applications include automating routine care, enriching environments, supporting behavioral studies, and enabling safe human–animal–robot collaboration. Advances in sensing, machine learning, and adaptive control now allow robots to interpret animal behavior in real time and respond appropriately, enhancing efficiency, safety, and welfare outcomes. Yet challenges remain, including ethical concerns, species-specific modeling, cost, and reliability in varied conditions. This chapter reviews system types, design principles, and applications, presents case studies from agriculture, research, and conservation, and examines future directions such as bio-inspired robotics, multimodal perception, and fully autonomous welfare monitoring platforms.