TEMO (Therapeutic Emotional LLM-powered Robot)

Over the past months, we have been developing TEMO (Therapeutic Emotional LLM-powered Robot), designed to support children with Autism Spectrum Disorder.

TEMO aims to make communication easier, more engaging, and emotionally supportive for children who often find traditional interaction challenging. It acts as a child-friendly assistant that is fine-tuned on an Applied Behavior Analysis dataset. With animated facial expressions, child-friendly dialogue, proactive speech, and a customized profile for each child, TEMO helps children practice communication skills, express emotions more comfortably, and feel safe, motivated, and understood.

Recently, TEMO was successfully evaluated at an autism center in Bahrain, interacting with children in real sessions. Watching the children smile, talk, and build a connection with the robot was truly inspiring.

This milestone marks a meaningful step toward integrating LLM-powered assistive robots into therapeutic environments.

I’m grateful to my advisor Saad Ezzini, who supported, guided, and built a fully functional robot with me, and I’m excited about the upcoming improvements.

By Ms. Fatimah Alali