The AIPER project, approved by the Saf€ra European consortium and nationally funded by the National Institute for Insurance against Accidents at Work (INAIL), was created to address the emerging health and safety challenges associated with the increasing use of collaborative robots in industrial settings. Although human-robot collaboration can improve productivity, flexibility and ergonomics, it can also expose workers to physical, cognitive and psychosocial risks if the robots are not properly designed or managed.

The AIPER project responds to this need by developing artificial intelligence-based tools to support workers, improve risk awareness and strengthen decision-making processes in environments where humans and robots work together.

In particular, the project will study how these tools influence workers' cognitive and physiological responses, health status, and confidence in human-robot collaboration. The aim is to contribute to the design of safer, healthier, and more efficient work environments.

The team from the Department of Management Engineering at Politecnico di Milano, which is coordinating the AIPER project and involves Università del Salento (Italy), IPARTIC Consulting (Spain), PESI (Spain), and INERIS (France) among its partners, will focus on health-related aspects through experimental studies and focus groups. These will analyse the cognitive and physiological impacts of AI-based support tools in different application contexts, such as assembly and quality control.