Related papers: MIRRAX: A Reconfigurable Robot for Limited Access …
Through the implementation of reconfigurability to achieve flexibility and adaptation to tasks by morphology changes rather than by increasing the number of joints, malleable robots present advantages over traditional serial robot arms in…
Many applications require robots to move through complex 3-D terrain with large obstacles, such as self-driving, search and rescue, and extraterrestrial exploration. Although robots are already excellent at avoiding sparse obstacles, they…
Collapsing terrains, often present in search and rescue missions or planetary exploration, pose significant challenges for quadruped robots. This paper introduces a robust locomotion framework for safe navigation over unstable surfaces by…
This paper addresses the fast replanning problem in dynamic environments with moving obstacles. Since for randomly moving obstacles the future states are unpredictable, the proposed method, called SMARRT, reacts to obstacle motions and…
Dynamic quadrupedal locomotion over rough terrains reveals remarkable progress over the last few decades. Small-scale quadruped robots are adequately flexible and adaptable to traverse uneven terrains along sagittal direction, such as…
Climbing robots face significant challenges when navigating unstructured environments, where reliable attachment to irregular surfaces is critical. We present a novel mobile climbing robot equipped with compliant pin-array structured…
Continuum robots (CR) offer excellent dexterity and compliance in contrast to rigid-link robots, making them suitable for navigating through, and interacting with, confined environments. However, the study of path planning for CRs while…
Deployment of robotic systems in the real world requires a certain level of robustness in order to deal with uncertainty factors, such as mismatches in the dynamics model, noise in sensor readings, and communication delays. Some approaches…
Miniature robots are untethered actuators, which have significant potential to make existing minimally invasive surgery considerably safer and painless, and enable unprecedented treatments because they are much smaller and dexterous than…
A hierarchical control architecture is presented for energy-efficient control of legged robots subject to variety of linear/nonlinear inequality constraints such as Coulomb friction cones, switching unilateral contacts, actuator saturation…
Solving mobile manipulation tasks in inaccessible and dangerous environments is an important application of robots to support humans. Example domains are construction and maintenance of manned and unmanned stations on the moon and other…
Path planning for multiple robots is well studied in the AI and robotics communities. For a given discretized environment, robots need to find collision-free paths to a set of specified goal locations. Robots can be fully anonymous,…
Continuum robots are well suited for navigating confined and fragile environments, such as vascular or endoluminal anatomy, where contact with surrounding structures is often unavoidable. While controlled contact can assist motion,…
Small-size robots offer access to spaces that are inaccessible to larger ones. This type of access is crucial in applications such as drug delivery, environmental detection, and collection of small samples. However, there are some tasks…
Navigating a large-scaled robot in unknown and cluttered height-constrained environments is challenging. Not only is a fast and reliable planning algorithm required to go around obstacles, the robot should also be able to change its…
We consider the case in which a robot has to navigate in an unknown environment but does not have enough on-board power or payload to carry a traditional depth sensor (e.g., a 3D lidar) and thus can only acquire a few (point-wise) depth…
This paper develops an algorithm that guides a multi-robot system in an unknown environment in search of fixed targets. The area to be scanned contains an unknown number of convex obstacles of unknown size and shape. The algorithm covers…
Mobile manipulators have been used for inspection, maintenance and repair tasks over the years, but there are some key limitations. Stability concerns typically require mobile platforms to be large in order to handle far-reaching…
Multi-mobile robot systems show great advantages over one single robot in many applications. However, the robots are required to form desired task-specified formations, making feasible motions decrease significantly. Thus, it is challenging…
Search and rescue (SAR) robots are required to quickly traverse terrain and perform high-force rescue tasks, necessitating both terrain adaptability and controlled high-force output. Few platforms exist today for SAR, and fewer still have…