Related papers: Multi-Layered Safety for Legged Robots via Control…
Control Lyapunov Functions (CLFs) and Control Barrier Functions (CBFs) can be combined, typically by means of Quadratic Programs (QPs), to design controllers that achieve performance and safety objectives. However, a significant limitation…
Thanks to recent advancements in accelerating non-linear model predictive control (NMPC), it is now feasible to deploy whole-body NMPC at real-time rates for humanoid robots. However, enforcing inequality constraints in real time for such…
Ensuring both performance and safety is critical for autonomous systems operating in real-world environments. While safety filters such as Control Barrier Functions (CBFs) enforce constraints by modifying nominal controllers in real time,…
Whole-body reactive obstacle avoidance for mobile manipulators (MM) remains an open research problem. Control Barrier Functions (CBF), combined with Quadratic Programming (QP), have become a popular approach for reactive control with safety…
Bringing dynamic robots into the wild requires a tenuous balance between performance and safety. Yet controllers designed to provide robust safety guarantees often result in conservative behavior, and tuning these controllers to find the…
Control Barrier Functions (CBFs) can provide provable safety guarantees for dynamic systems. However, finding a valid CBF for a system of interest is often non-trivial, especially for systems having low computational resources, higher-order…
This paper addresses the challenge of safe stabilization, ensuring the system state reach the origin while avoiding unsafe regions. Existing approaches relying on smooth Lyapunov barrier functions often fail to guarantee a feasible…
Control Barrier Function (CBF) is an emerging method that guarantees safety in path planning problems by generating a control command to ensure the forward invariance of a safety set. Most of the developments up to date assume availability…
In this paper, we present a novel two-level variable Horizon Model Predictive Control (VH-MPC) framework for bipedal locomotion. In this framework, the higher level computes the landing location and timing (horizon length) of the swing foot…
This paper addresses the challenge of terrain-adaptive dynamic locomotion in humanoid robots, a problem traditionally tackled by optimization-based methods or reinforcement learning (RL). Optimization-based methods, such as model-predictive…
Ensuring operational safety is critical for human-to-humanoid motion imitation. This paper presents a vision-based framework that enables a humanoid robot to imitate human movements while avoiding collisions. Human skeletal keypoints are…
We propose a novel cooperative herding strategy through backstepping control barrier functions (CBFs), which coordinates multiple herders to herd a group of evaders safely towards a designated goal region. For the herding system with…
This paper presents a motion planning algorithm for quadruped locomotion based on density functions. We decompose the locomotion problem into a high-level density planner and a model predictive controller (MPC). Due to density functions…
To enable flexible, high-throughput automation in settings where people and robots share workspaces, collaborative robotic cells must reconcile stringent safety guarantees with the need for responsive and effective behavior. A dynamic…
Achieving safe quadrupedal locomotion in real-world environments has attracted much attention in recent years. When walking over uneven terrain, achieving reliable estimation and realising safety-critical control based on the obtained…
Humanoid robots often face significant balance issues due to the motion of their heavy limbs. These challenges are particularly pronounced when attempting dynamic motion or operating in environments with irregular terrain. To address this…
Legged locomotion is a complex control problem that requires both accuracy and robustness to cope with real-world challenges. Legged systems have traditionally been controlled using trajectory optimization with inverse dynamics. Such…
Legged robots must exhibit robust and agile locomotion across diverse, unstructured terrains, a challenge exacerbated under blind locomotion settings where terrain information is unavailable. This work introduces a hierarchical…
Control Barrier Functions (CBFs) have emerged as efficient tools to address the safe navigation problem for robot applications. However, synthesizing informative and obstacle motion-aware CBFs online using real-time sensor data remains…
Modern robotic systems are endowed with superior mobility and mechanical skills that make them suited to be employed in real-world scenarios, where interactions with heavy objects and precise manipulation capabilities are required. For…