Related papers: A light-weight, multi-axis compliant tensegrity jo…

The design of physical compliance -- its location, degree, and structure -- affects robot performance and robustness in contact-rich tasks. While compliance is often used in the robot's joints, flange, or end-effector, this paper proposes…

Synthetic active collectives, composed of many nonliving individuals capable of cooperative changes in group shape and dynamics, hold promise for practical applications and for the elucidation of guiding principles of natural collectives.…

This paper proposes a unified approach for dynamic modeling and simulations of general tensegrity structures with rigid bars and rigid bodies of arbitrary shapes. The natural coordinates are adopted as a non-minimal description in terms of…

A novel unified approach to jointly optimize structural design parameters, actuator and sensor precision and controller parameters is presented in this paper. The joint optimization problem is posed as a covariance control problem, where…

In assistive robots, compliant actuator is a key component in establishing safe and satisfactory physical human-robot interaction (pHRI). The performance of compliant actuators largely depends on the stiffness of the elastic element.…

Modeling realistic human joint limits is important for applications involving physical human-robot interaction. However, setting appropriate human joint limits is challenging because it is pose-dependent: the range of joint motion varies…

Tendon-driven musculoskeletal humanoids have many benefits in terms of the flexible spine, multiple degrees of freedom, and variable stiffness. At the same time, because of its body complexity, there are problems in controllability. First,…

Compared to traditional rigid robotics, soft robotics has attracted increasing attention due to its advantages as compliance, safety, and low cost. As an essential part of soft robotics, the soft robotic gripper also shows its superior…

Functional magnetic composites capable of large deformation, load bearing, and multifunctional motion are essential for next-generation adaptive soft robots. Here, we present muscle-inspired magnetic actuators (MMA), additively manufactured…

Tendon-driven under-actuated robotic fingers provide advantages for dexterous manipulation through reduced actuator requirements and simplified mechanical design. However, achieving both high load capacity and adaptive compliance in a…

This study presents the design and the kinematic optimization of a novel, underactuated, linkage-based robotic hand exoskeleton to assist users in performing grasping tasks. The device has been designed to apply only normal forces to the…

In the present work, irregular complex joints of the human arm are modelled in the computer-aided design environment. Accurately the geometric models of the joints and surrounding bony regions are developed from computed tomography data set…

Robots will become ubiquitously useful only when they can use few attempts to teach themselves to perform different tasks, even with complex bodies and in dynamical environments. Vertebrates, in fact, successfully use trial-and-error to…

Tendon-actuated concentric tube mechanisms combine the advantages of tendon-driven continuum robots and concentric tube robots while addressing their respective limitations. They overcome the restricted degrees of freedom often seen in…

Advanced machine learning algorithms require platforms that are extremely robust and equipped with rich sensory feedback to handle extensive trial-and-error learning without relying on strong inductive biases. Traditional robotic designs,…

Adapting upper-limb impedance (i.e., stiffness, damping, inertia) is essential for humans interacting with dynamic environments for executing grasping or manipulation tasks. On the other hand, control methods designed for state-of-the-art…

Hand synergies, or joint coordination patterns, have become an effective tool for achieving versatile robotic grasping with simple hands or planning algorithms. Here we propose a method to determine the hand synergies such that they can be…

While most insect-inspired robots come with a simple tarsus such as a hemispherical foot tip, insect legs have complex tarsal structures and claws, which enable them to walk on complex terrain. Their sharp claws can smoothly attach and…

The impressive capabilities of humans to robustly perform manipulation relies on compliant interactions, enabled through the structure and materials spatially distributed in our hands. We propose by mimicking this distributed compliance in…

Highly articulated organisms serve as blueprints for incredibly dexterous mechanisms, but building similarly capable robotic counterparts has been hindered by the difficulties of developing electromechanical actuators with both the high…