Related papers: Design, Implementation and Evaluation of a Variabl…
We present a novel underactued humanoid five finger soft hand, the KIT \softhand, which is equipped with cameras in the fingertips and integrates a high performance embedded system for visual processing and control. We describe the…
Most robotic hands and grippers rely on actuators with large gearboxes and force sensors for controlling gripping force. However, this might not be ideal for tasks which require the robot to interact with an unstructured and/or unknown…
Natural muscles provide mobility in response to nerve impulses. Electromyography (EMG) measures the electrical activity of muscles in response to a nerve's stimulation. In the past few decades, EMG signals have been used extensively in the…
The paper presents a new stiffness modeling method for overconstrained parallel manipulators with flexible links and compliant actuating joints. It is based on a multidimensional lumped-parameter model that replaces the link flexibility by…
Assistive robotic arms enable users with physical disabilities to perform everyday tasks without relying on a caregiver. Unfortunately, the very dexterity that makes these arms useful also makes them challenging to teleoperate: the robot…
Frictional influences in tendon-driven robotic systems are generally unwanted, with efforts towards minimizing them where possible. In the human hand however, the tendon-pulley system is found to be frictional with a difference between…
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…
Using shear wave elastography, we measure the changes in the wave speed with the stress produced by a striated muscle during isometric voluntary contraction. To isolate the behaviour of an individual muscle from complementary or…
In this work, the novel, open-source humanoid robot, PANDORA, is presented where a majority of the structural elements are manufactured using 3D-printed compliant materials. As opposed to contemporary approaches that incorporate the elastic…
Series Elastic Actuators provide many benefits in force control of robots in unconstrained environments. These benefits include high force fidelity, extremely low impedance, low friction, and good force control bandwidth. Series Elastic…
Ankle push-off largely contributes to limb energy generation in human walking, leading to smoother and more efficient locomotion. Providing this net positive work to an amputee requires an active prosthesis, but has the potential to enable…
In this paper, we explore the use of a soft gripper, specifically a soft inverting-everting toroidal hydrostat, as a prosthetic hand. We present a design of the gripper integrated into a body-powered elbow-driven system and evaluate its…
In this paper, we present a light-weight, multi- axis compliant tenegrity joint that is biologically inspired by the human elbow. This tensegrity elbow actuates by shortening and lengthening cable in a method inspired by muscular actuation…
By learning Variable Impedance Control policy, robot assistants can intelligently adapt their manipulation compliance to ensure both safe interaction and proper task completion when operating in human-robot interaction environments. In this…
Active inference, a theoretical construct inspired by brain processing, is a promising alternative to control artificial agents. However, current methods do not yet scale to high-dimensional inputs in continuous control. Here we present a…
Thumb gestures provide an effective and unobtrusive input modality for wearable and always-available human-machine interaction. Wrist-worn surface electromyography (sEMG) has emerged as a promising approach for compact and wearable…
Soft robots are notoriously hard to control. This is partly due to the scarcity of models able to capture their complex continuum mechanics, resulting in a lack of control methodologies that take full advantage of body compliance. Currently…
This work tackles practical issues which arise when using a tendon-driven robotic manipulator (TDRM) with a long, flexible, passive proximal section in medical applications. Tendon-driven devices are preferred in medicine for their improved…
This article introduces a framework for complex human-robot collaboration tasks, such as the co-manufacturing of furniture. For these tasks, it is essential to encode tasks from human demonstration and reproduce these skills in a compliant…
In this paper, we demonstrate a proof-of-concept implementation of a framework for the development of edge-connected prosthetic systems. The framework is composed of a bionic hand equipped with a camera and connected to a Jetson device that…