15,205 research outputs found
Whole-Body MPC for a Dynamically Stable Mobile Manipulator
Autonomous mobile manipulation offers a dual advantage of mobility provided
by a mobile platform and dexterity afforded by the manipulator. In this paper,
we present a whole-body optimal control framework to jointly solve the problems
of manipulation, balancing and interaction as one optimization problem for an
inherently unstable robot. The optimization is performed using a Model
Predictive Control (MPC) approach; the optimal control problem is transcribed
at the end-effector space, treating the position and orientation tasks in the
MPC planner, and skillfully planning for end-effector contact forces. The
proposed formulation evaluates how the control decisions aimed at end-effector
tracking and environment interaction will affect the balance of the system in
the future. We showcase the advantages of the proposed MPC approach on the
example of a ball-balancing robot with a robotic manipulator and validate our
controller in hardware experiments for tasks such as end-effector pose tracking
and door opening
Safe Robotic Grasping: Minimum Impact-Force Grasp Selection
This paper addresses the problem of selecting from a choice of possible
grasps, so that impact forces will be minimised if a collision occurs while the
robot is moving the grasped object along a post-grasp trajectory. Such
considerations are important for safety in human-robot interaction, where even
a certified "human-safe" (e.g. compliant) arm may become hazardous once it
grasps and begins moving an object, which may have significant mass, sharp
edges or other dangers. Additionally, minimising collision forces is critical
to preserving the longevity of robots which operate in uncertain and hazardous
environments, e.g. robots deployed for nuclear decommissioning, where removing
a damaged robot from a contaminated zone for repairs may be extremely difficult
and costly. Also, unwanted collisions between a robot and critical
infrastructure (e.g. pipework) in such high-consequence environments can be
disastrous. In this paper, we investigate how the safety of the post-grasp
motion can be considered during the pre-grasp approach phase, so that the
selected grasp is optimal in terms applying minimum impact forces if a
collision occurs during a desired post-grasp manipulation. We build on the
methods of augmented robot-object dynamics models and "effective mass" and
propose a method for combining these concepts with modern grasp and trajectory
planners, to enable the robot to achieve a grasp which maximises the safety of
the post-grasp trajectory, by minimising potential collision forces. We
demonstrate the effectiveness of our approach through several experiments with
both simulated and real robots.Comment: To be appeared in IEEE/RAS IROS 201
Sensorless torque/force control
Motion control systems represent a main subsystem for majority of processing systems that can be found in the industrial sector. These systems are concerned with the actuation of all devices in the manufacturing process such as machines, robots, conveyor systems and pick and place mechanisms such that they satisfy certain motion requirements, e.g., the pre specified reference trajectories are followed along with delivering the proper force or torque to the point of interest at which the process occurs. In general, the aim of force/torque control
is to impose the desired force on the environment even if the environment has dynamical motion
Autonomy Infused Teleoperation with Application to BCI Manipulation
Robot teleoperation systems face a common set of challenges including
latency, low-dimensional user commands, and asymmetric control inputs. User
control with Brain-Computer Interfaces (BCIs) exacerbates these problems
through especially noisy and erratic low-dimensional motion commands due to the
difficulty in decoding neural activity. We introduce a general framework to
address these challenges through a combination of computer vision, user intent
inference, and arbitration between the human input and autonomous control
schemes. Adjustable levels of assistance allow the system to balance the
operator's capabilities and feelings of comfort and control while compensating
for a task's difficulty. We present experimental results demonstrating
significant performance improvement using the shared-control assistance
framework on adapted rehabilitation benchmarks with two subjects implanted with
intracortical brain-computer interfaces controlling a seven degree-of-freedom
robotic manipulator as a prosthetic. Our results further indicate that shared
assistance mitigates perceived user difficulty and even enables successful
performance on previously infeasible tasks. We showcase the extensibility of
our architecture with applications to quality-of-life tasks such as opening a
door, pouring liquids from containers, and manipulation with novel objects in
densely cluttered environments
Efficient Humanoid Contact Planning using Learned Centroidal Dynamics Prediction
Humanoid robots dynamically navigate an environment by interacting with it
via contact wrenches exerted at intermittent contact poses. Therefore, it is
important to consider dynamics when planning a contact sequence. Traditional
contact planning approaches assume a quasi-static balance criterion to reduce
the computational challenges of selecting a contact sequence over a rough
terrain. This however limits the applicability of the approach when dynamic
motions are required, such as when walking down a steep slope or crossing a
wide gap. Recent methods overcome this limitation with the help of efficient
mixed integer convex programming solvers capable of synthesizing dynamic
contact sequences. Nevertheless, its exponential-time complexity limits its
applicability to short time horizon contact sequences within small
environments. In this paper, we go beyond current approaches by learning a
prediction of the dynamic evolution of the robot centroidal momenta, which can
then be used for quickly generating dynamically robust contact sequences for
robots with arms and legs using a search-based contact planner. We demonstrate
the efficiency and quality of the results of the proposed approach in a set of
dynamically challenging scenarios
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