Inverse Kinematics without matrix inversion

This paper presents a new singularity robust and computationally efficient method for solving the inverse kinematics (IK) problem. In this method, the transformation from Cartesian space to joint space is performed in a feedback loop and as a result the new feedback inverse kinematics (FIK) law operates as a filter and does not require matrix manipulations (inversion, singular value decomposition or a computation of a damping factor). While the computational demand is greatly reduced, the performance is comparable to the one delivered by the damped least squares (DLS) law. The new algorithm is capable of escaping and avoiding kinematic singularities and in this respect it outperforms pseudo-inverse based formulations