Related papers: Soft Surfaced Vision-Based Tactile Sensing for Bip…
While tactile skins have been shown to be useful for detecting collisions between a robotic arm and its environment, they have not been extensively used for improving robotic grasping and in-hand manipulation. We propose a novel sensor…
Bipedal balance is challenging due to its multi-phase, hybrid nature and high-dimensional state space. Traditional balance control approaches for bipedal robots rely on low-dimensional models for locomotion planning and reactive control,…
Robots play a critical role as the physical agent of human operators in exploring the ocean. However, it remains challenging to grasp objects reliably while fully submerging under a highly pressurized aquatic environment with little visible…
We present a footstep planning policy for quadrupedal locomotion that is able to directly take into consideration a-priori safety information in its decisions. At its core, a learning process analyzes terrain patches, classifying each…
Animals in nature combine multiple modalities, such as sight and feel, to perceive terrain and develop an understanding of how to walk on uneven terrain in a stable manner. Similarly, legged robots need to develop their ability to stably…
This paper introduces a framework for state estimation on a humanoid robot platform using only common proprioceptive sensors and knowledge of leg kinematics. The presented approach extends that detailed in [1] on a quadruped platform by…
Differentiable simulators promise to improve sample efficiency in robot learning by providing analytic gradients of the system dynamics. Yet, their application to contact-rich tasks like locomotion is complicated by the inherently…
While quadruped robots usually have good stability and load capacity, bipedal robots offer a higher level of flexibility / adaptability to different tasks and environments. A multi-modal legged robot can take the best of both worlds. In…
In this paper we propose a novel bipedal locomotion controller that uses noisy exteroception to traverse a wide variety of terrains. Building on the cutting-edge advancements in attention based belief encoding for quadrupedal locomotion,…
Predicting the future interaction of objects when they come into contact with their environment is key for autonomous agents to take intelligent and anticipatory actions. This paper presents a perception framework that fuses visual and…
Task space trajectory tracking for quadruped robots plays a crucial role on achieving dexterous maneuvers in unstructured environments. To fulfill the control objective, the robot should apply forces through the contact of the legs with the…
Agile-legged robots have proven to be highly effective in navigating and performing tasks in complex and challenging environments, including disaster zones and industrial settings. However, these applications normally require the capability…
Incorporating effective tactile sensing and mechanical compliance is key towards enabling robust and safe operation of robots in unknown, uncertain and cluttered environments. Towards realizing this goal, we present a lightweight,…
To foster an immersive and natural human-robot interaction, the implementation of tactile perception and feedback becomes imperative, effectively bridging the conventional sensory gap. In this paper, we propose a dual-modal electronic skin…
As automation technologies advance, the need for compact and multi-modal sensors in robotic applications is growing. To address this demand, we introduce CompdVision, a novel sensor that employs a compound-eye imaging system to combine…
Tactile sensing is an essential capability for robots that carry out dexterous manipulation tasks. While cameras, Lidars and other remote sensors can assess a scene globally and instantly, tactile sensors can reduce their measurement…
Limitations in actuation, sensing, and computation have forced small legged robots to rely on carefully tuned, mechanically mediated leg trajectories for effective locomotion. Recent advances in manufacturing, however, have enabled the…
Legged robots can outperform wheeled machines for most navigation tasks across unknown and rough terrains. For such tasks, visual feedback is a fundamental asset to provide robots with terrain-awareness. However, robust dynamic locomotion…
In this paper, we study integrated estimation and control of soft robots. A significant challenge in deploying closed loop controllers is reliable proprioception via integrated sensing in soft robots. Despite the considerable advances…
This paper introduces a novel proprioceptive state estimator for legged robots based on a learned displacement measurement from IMU data. Recent research in pedestrian tracking has shown that motion can be inferred from inertial data using…