Photo/Illutration Ukrainian children fleeing to Poland pet a robotic seal called Paro to help relieve anxiety. (Provided by the neurology and psychiatry center of Poland’s Mazovia province)

TSUKUBA, Ibaraki Prefecture--In a lab tightly packed with models of therapy robots, a harp seal with light pink hair looked up at the person stroking its fluffy head and let out an affectionate squeak.

This is Paro, one of the world’s most successful therapeutic robots--popular to the extent that some refer to it as “Japan’s pride.”

“I came up with the idea for a pet robot because I thought consumers would welcome machines that do not do home chores like washing clothes and cleaning rooms,” said its creator, Takanori Shibata, a top researcher at the National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology.

The seal’s body, whiskers and nose are outfitted with visual, tactile and auditory sensors. Using artificial intelligence, it can recognize its surroundings and respond to being rubbed with corresponding sounds.

The robotic seals can remember their nicknames and react to them when called. And if kept long enough, they even eventually develop their own habits.

If that sounds more like a pet than a robot, that is because it was designed to make patients feel calm and content.

Clinical research shows that when people suffering from dementia hold and speak to Paro, it can make their peripheral symptoms milder, providing benefits similar to animal therapy.

One U.S. study showed a drop in anxiety that allowed doctors to cut their patients’ intake of psychotropic drugs by 30 percent. And miraculously, the robot produces effects that last more than two hours longer than the drugs.

In Britain, Paro is included in a governmental organization’s guidelines for non-drug dementia treatment options covered by public health insurance.

More than 7,000 units are now available at hospitals and care homes across some 30 countries, but this remarkable model was nearly a no-go.

DOGS, CATS REJECTED OVER SEAL MODEL

When Shibata started his research in 1993, it was difficult to secure funding in Japan. Instead, he started working on it while doubling as a researcher in the United States at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Artificial Intelligence Laboratory.

In the United States, animal therapy had been a subject of formal academic research for three decades, and Shibata soon learned it had been used to help everyone from cancer patients to children with developmental disabilities.

Shibata created three prototypes modeled on a dog, cat and seal, which he gave to MIT students to try out.

They were most excited about the dog and cat. But most ended up ranking them lower than the seals, Shibata said. For some foreign students, the reason seemed cultural.

They knew less about the seal, so they brought in fewer preconceptions.

But choosing the best animal was only the first upgrade. After the first-generation Paro was completed in 1998, improvements, such as reduction in weight, were continuously made.

By the eighth-generation Paro, it was ready for mass production. The latest model, the ninth, is still not cheap. It carries a price tag of 450,000 yen ($3,200), though it costs nearly twice as much outside Japan.

But the benefits seem to have made the high cost worth it. While real animals are often prohibited from medical centers and seniors’ homes, the antimicrobial features of Paro’s artificial hair mean that it can even stay with patients in intensive care units.

Robot owners also do not suffer the devastation tied to losing a beloved pet.

Paro can also go anywhere safely. Officials sent 80 units to evacuation centers and elsewhere in the aftermath of the 2011 Great East Japan Earthquake and tsunami to help survivors cope.

More recently, Paro made headlines after six units were donated to four medical institutions in Poland this summer to aid in the psychological care of Ukrainians fleeing their war-torn nation after the Russian invasion.

Now, Shibata thinks it is time to fulfill his goal of having his invention designated as medical equipment in Japan. He said plans are already under way to hold a clinical trial with a Japanese hospital.

“We will be helping to lower social costs by lessening the use of drugs and through other means,” Shibata said.

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