Related papers: Quasistatic contact-rich manipulation via linear c…
This paper uses a mobile manipulator with a collaborative robotic arm to manipulate objects beyond the robot's maximum payload. It proposes a single-shot probabilistic roadmap-based method to plan and optimize manipulation motion with…
The hybrid nature of multi-contact robotic systems, due to making and breaking contact with the environment, creates significant challenges for high-quality control. Existing model-based methods typically rely on either good prior knowledge…
This paper investigates the control problem of steering a group of spherical mobile robots to cooperatively transport a spherical object. By controlling the movements of the robots to exert appropriate contact (pushing) forces, it is…
Logic-Geometric Programming (LGP) is a powerful motion and manipulation planning framework, which represents hierarchical structure using logic rules that describe discrete aspects of problems, e.g., touch, grasp, hit, or push, and solves…
Linear models for control and motion generation of humanoid robots have received significant attention in the past years, not only due to their well known theoretical guarantees, but also because of practical computational advantages.…
Loco-manipulation planning skills are pivotal for expanding the utility of robots in everyday environments. These skills can be assessed based on a system's ability to coordinate complex holistic movements and multiple contact interactions…
Humanoid robots have great potential for real-world applications due to their ability to operate in environments built for humans, but their deployment is hindered by the challenge of controlling their underlying high-dimensional nonlinear…
Model predictive control (MPC) of hybrid dynamical systems is challenging because the associated optimization problem is nonsmooth and the resulting feedback law is discontinuous. This paper develops real-time MPC algorithms for nonlinear…
Recent advancements in constrained kinematic control make it an attractive strategy for controlling robots with arbitrary geometry in challenging tasks. Most current works assume that the robot kinematic model is precise enough for the task…
A key challenge in contact-rich dexterous manipulation is the need to jointly reason over geometry, kinematic constraints, and intricate, nonsmooth contact dynamics. End-to-end visuomotor policies bypass this structure, but often require…
The dynamic Sequential Mobile Manipulation Planning (SMMP) framework is essential for the safe and robust operation of mobile manipulators in dynamic environments. Previous research has primarily focused on either motion-level or task-level…
Robots often face manipulation tasks in environments where vision is inadequate due to clutter, occlusions, or poor lighting--for example, reaching a shutoff valve at the back of a sink cabinet or locating a light switch above a crowded…
Contact-implicit motion planning-embedding contact sequencing as implicit complementarity constraints-holds the promise of leveraging continuous optimization to discover new contact patterns online. Nevertheless, the resulting optimization,…
We propose a quantum-assisted framework for solving constrained finite-horizon nonlinear optimal control problems using a barrier Sequential Quadratic Programming (SQP) approach. Within this framework, a quantum subroutine is incorporated…
The paper proposes an approach for the efficient model order reduction of dynamic contact problems in linear elasticity. Instead of the augmented Lagrangian method that is widely used for mechanical contact problems, we prefer here the…
Robotic manipulation research has investigated contact-rich problems and strategies that require robots to intentionally collide with their environment, to accomplish tasks that cannot be handled by traditional collision-free solutions. By…
This paper considers a risk-sensitive optimal control problem for a field-mediated interconnection of a quantum plant with a coherent (measurement-free) quantum controller. The plant and the controller are multimode open quantum harmonic…
This article presents a unified approach to quadratic optimal control for both linear and nonlinear discrete-time systems, with a focus on trajectory tracking. The control strategy is based on minimizing a quadratic cost function that…
Recent successes in applying reinforcement learning (RL) for robotics has shown it is a viable approach for constructing robotic controllers. However, RL controllers can produce many collisions in environments where new obstacles appear…
We propose a hybrid model predictive control algorithm, consensus complementarity control (C3), for systems that make and break contact with their environment. Many state-of-the-art controllers for tasks which require initiating contact…