Review and perspectives on multimodal perception, mutual cognition, and embodied execution for human–robot collaboration in Industry 5.0

Abstract

Industry 5.0 represents a paradigm shift from efficiency-oriented automation to human-centric, resilient, and sustainable manufacturing, where human–robot collaboration (HRC) plays a crucial role by combining human flexibility with robotic precision. However, current HRC systems remain reactive and fragmented, lacking the alignment across perception, cognition, and execution required for seamless collaboration and robust generalization. While generative large models (GLMs) are emerging as a promising solution to these challenges, their integration into HRC exhibits a notable temporal lag compared to robotic domains, necessitating a systematic cross-domain synergy. This paper presents a review of GLM-enhanced HRC and proposes a prospective blueprint of multimodal perception, mutual cognition, and embodied execution for HRC in Industry 5.0. This blueprint outlines potential pathways toward human-centric smart manufacturing by synergizing generative artificial intelligence and embodied intelligence.