Related papers: Measuring information transfer in a soft robotic a…
Recent advancements in robot tool use have unlocked their usage for novel tasks, yet the predominant focus is on rigid-body tools, while the investigation of soft-body tools and their dynamic interaction with rigid bodies remains…
Many organisms, including various species of spiders and caterpillars, change their shape to switch gaits and adapt to different environments. Recent technological advances, ranging from stretchable circuits to highly deformable soft…
Due to their ability to move without sliding relative to their environment, soft growing robots are attractive for deploying distributed sensor networks in confined spaces. Sensing of the state of such robots would also add to their…
Dynamic control of a soft-body robot to deliver complex behaviors with low-dimensional actuation inputs is challenging. In this paper, we present a computational approach to automatically generate versatile, underactuated control policies…
During social interactions, people use auditory, visual, and haptic cues to convey their thoughts, emotions, and intentions. Due to weight, energy, and other hardware constraints, it is difficult to create devices that completely capture…
Whole-arm tactile sensing enables a robot to sense contact and infer contact properties across its entire arm. Within this paper, we demonstrate that using data-driven methods, a humanoid robot can infer mechanical properties of objects…
Dynamic motions are a key feature of robotic arms, enabling them to perform tasks quickly and efficiently. Soft continuum manipulators do not currently consider dynamic parameters when operating in task space. This shortcoming makes…
Robotic grasping under uncertainty remains a fundamental challenge due to its uncertain and contact-rich nature. Traditional rigid robotic hands, with limited degrees of freedom and compliance, rely on complex model-based and heavy feedback…
Soft robots have the potential to revolutionize the use of robotic systems with their capability of establishing safe, robust, and adaptable interactions with their environment, but their precise control remains challenging. In contrast,…
Movement in biology is often achieved with distributed control of coupled subcomponents, e.g. muscles and limbs. Coupling could range from weak and local, i.e. decentralized, to strong and global, i.e. centralized. We developed a model-free…
Geometric mechanics provides valuable insights into how biological and robotic systems use changes in shape to move by mechanically interacting with their environment. In high-friction environments it provides that the entire interaction is…
This paper presents an approach to externally influencing a team of robots by means of time-varying density functions. These density functions represent rough references for where the robots should be located. To this end, a continuous-time…
Reusing the tactile knowledge of some previously-explored objects helps us humans to easily recognize the tactual properties of new objects. In this master thesis, we enable arobotic arm equipped with multi-modal artificial skin, like…
The functional demands of robotic systems often require completing various tasks or behaviors under the effect of disturbances or uncertain environments. Of increasing interest is the autonomy for dynamic robots, such as multirotors, motor…
Humans leverage multiple sensor modalities when interacting with objects and discovering their intrinsic properties. Using the visual modality alone is insufficient for deriving intuition behind object properties (e.g., which of two boxes…
High-performance closed-loop control of truly soft continuum manipulators has remained elusive. Experimental demonstrations have largely relied on sufficiently stiff, piecewise architectures in which each actuated segment behaves as a…
This paper presents the application of a learning control approach for the realization of a fast and reliable pick-and-place application with a spherical soft robotic arm. The arm is characterized by a lightweight design and exhibits…
Robot-to-human object handover is an essential skill for robot assistants, from serving drinks at home to passing surgical tools in the operating room. We expect robots to perform handover robustly -- to release the object only after a firm…
Soft robots are distinguished by their flexibility and adaptability, allowing them to perform nearly impossible tasks for rigid robots. However, controlling their behavior is challenging due to their nonlinear material response and infinite…
Active soft bodies can affect their shape through an internal actuation mechanism that induces a deformation. Similar to recent work, this paper utilizes a differentiable, quasi-static, and physics-based simulation layer to optimize for…