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In autonomous bimanual operation of a robot, parallelized planning and execution of a task is essential. Elements of a task have different functional and spatial relationships. They may depend on each other and have to be executed in a specific order or they may be independent and their order can be determined freely. Consequently, individual actio...
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... a humanoid robot should serve as an assistant in the household ( Fig. 1), it has to be able to analyze a task and decide how to execute it. To be accepted, a household assistant has to be able to mimic the reasoning process and the execution speed of humans. Humans use mostly the arms and the upper body for manipulation tasks. The upper body extends the workspace of each arm, while the two arms allow ...
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... separate walking and manipulation planning. If the robot is still far from the object to be manipulated the path planner does not need to consider the robot arms in the motion planning [10]. All introduced papers address only elementary tasks and apply the same planner throughout the task. Let us assume a humanoid robot with two arms like Justin (Fig. 1) has to solve a complex manipulation task such as setting the table. The path planning for the whole task is performed with a path planner that works in the combined configuration space of both arms. In this case, actions are coupled through path planning that have no functional connections. The structure identified on a logical level ...
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... the paths executed separately. As the color-coding of the cubes shows, the choice of which cube to move next and where to place it, leaves room for optimization through a task planner. Also planning and execution was not yet interleaved. The video accompanying the paper illustrates the execution of the trajectories. A few snapshots are shown in Fig. 10. The video shows that the results of the path optimization for the 14 DOF planner are very unsatisfactory. Path optimization in the 14 DOF configuration space is more difficult since both robot arms are considered simultaneously and can collide with the environment but also with the other ...
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Citations
... Some of these works are related to the design and application [9], [10]. Moreover, there are other works focused on the problem of implementing a dual-arm manipulation controller or even object balance manipulation [11], [12], [13], [14], [15]. Note that the field of dual-arm manipulation as well as balance control of legged robots suffers from the same challenge as pointed out in [16]. ...
This work presents an extension of balance control for torque-controlled humanoid robots. Within a non-strict task hierarchy, the controller allows the robot to use the feet endeffectors to balance, while the remaining hand end-effectors can be used to perform Dual-Arm manipulation. The controller generates a passive and compliance behaviour to regulate the location of the centre of mass (CoM), the orientation of the hip and the poses of each end-effector assigned to the task of interaction (in this case bi-manipulation). Then, an appropriate wrench (force and torque) is applied to each of the end-effectors employed for the task to achieve this purpose. Now, in this new controller, the essential requirement focuses on the fact that the desired wrench in the CoM is computed through the sum of the balancing and bi-manipulation wrenches. The bimanipulation wrenches are obtained through a new dynamic model that allows executing tasks of approaching the grip and manipulation of large objects compliantly. On the other hand, the feedback controller has been maintained but in combination with a bi-manipulation-oriented feedforward control to improve the performance in the object trajectory tracking. This controller is tested in different experiments with the robot TORO.
... Robots like Herb 2.0 [2], HoLLiE [3], Rollin Justin [4] have been developed and studied for bi-manual mobile manipulation. In [5] parallelized planning and execution of tasks using a bi-manual robot is implemented using Rollin Justin. Independent tasks are planned using parallel path planners and dependent tasks which need both the arms are planned using a single motion planner. ...
... In bimanual tasks there are always temporal or spatial dependencies in the execution of the motions generated for each individual arm. One of the key issues in planning bimanual tasks is the decision on the structure of the planner, i.e., deciding the convenience of using independent planners parametrized for each arm or a single planner that considers the combined number of DoF for the two arms [74]. For the first approach, the task can be planned in disjunct workspaces by splitting the complete workspace in two distinct subsets that provide mutually exclusive workspaces for the arms. ...
... Using the Shuttle and Space Station Robotic Manipulator System (SRMS, SSRMS), respectively, the International Space Station (ISS) was assembled out of several modules by applying the principle of in-space robotic assembly (ISRA) (Mohan and Miller, 2009). Small robotic satellites are planned to serve for inspection purposes (Stoll et al., 2012) and NASA's Robonaut (Diftler et al., 2012) or comparable systems such as DLR's humanoid robot Justin (Zacharias et al., 2010) are candidates for future extravehicular activity (EVA) support operations. Similar to ISRA and EVA support, dexterous robotic manipulators are planned to be utilized to capture, maintain and/or de-orbit operational and defective satellites within on-orbit servicing and active debris removal missions (Hirzinger et al., 2004). ...
This paper presents a robotic capture concept that was developed as part of the e.deorbit study by ESA. The defective and tumbling satellite ENVISAT was chosen as a potential target to be captured, stabilized, and subsequently de-orbited in a controlled manner. A robotic capture concept was developed that is based on a chaser satellite equipped with a seven degrees-of-freedom dexterous robotic manipulator, holding a dedicated linear two-bracket gripper. The satellite is also equipped with a clamping mechanism for achieving a stiff fixation with the grasped target, following their combined satellite-stack de-tumbling and prior to the execution of the de-orbit maneuver. Driving elements of the robotic design, operations and control are described and analyzed. These include pre and post-capture operations, the task-specific kinematics of the manipulator, the intrinsic mechanical arm flexibility and its effect on the arm's positioning accuracy, visual tracking, as well as the interaction between the manipulator controller and that of the chaser satellite. The kinematics analysis yielded robust reachability of the grasp point. The effects of intrinsic arm flexibility turned out to be noticeable but also effectively scalable through robot joint speed adaption throughout the maneuvers. During most of the critical robot arm operations, the internal robot joint torques are shown to be within the design limits. These limits are only reached for a limiting scenario of tumbling motion of ENVISAT, consisting of an initial pure spin of 5 deg/s about its unstable intermediate axis of inertia. The computer vision performance was found to be satisfactory with respect to positioning accuracy requirements. Further developments are necessary and are being pursued to meet the stringent mission-related robustness requirements. Overall, the analyses conducted in this study showed that the capture and de-orbiting of ENVISAT using the proposed robotic concept is feasible with respect to relevant mission requirements and for most of the operational scenarios considered. Future work aims at developing a combined chaser-robot system controller. This will include a visual servo to minimize the positioning errors during the contact phases of the mission (grasping and clamping). Further validation of the visual tracking in orbital lighting conditions will be pursued.
... Examples include assembly manipulation [14], [15], [16], [17] and objects handling [18]. c) Discussing only reaching motions [19], [20], [21] or noncooperative tasks [22], [23]. This case is most similar to the usual multi-arm path planning where robot arms move independently but coordinatively to reach their goals without colliding with one another. ...
Planning motions for two robot arms to move an object collaboratively is a difficult problem, mainly because of the closed-chain constraint, which arises whenever two robot hands simultaneously grasp a single rigid object. In this paper, we propose a manipulation planning algorithm to bring an object from an initial stable placement (position and orientation of the object on the support surface) towards a goal stable placement. The key specificity of our algorithm is that it is certified-complete: for a given object and a given environment, we provide a certificate that the algorithm will find a solution to any bimanual manipulation query in that environment whenever one exists. Moreover, the certificate is constructive: at run-time, it can be used to quickly find a solution to a given query. The algorithm is tested in software and hardware on a number of large pieces of furniture.
... The major advantage of ISRA is that it allows to overcome launcher limitations with respect to size and mass. Small robotic satellites are planned to serve for inspection purposes [9] and NASA's Robonaut [10] or comparable systems such as DLR's humanoid robot Justin [11] are candidates for future EVA support operations. Similar to ISRA and EVA support, dexterous robotic manipulators are planned to be utilized to capture, maintain and/or de-orbit operational and defective satellites within on-orbit servicing (OOS) missions [12]. ...
This paper describes a unified and holistic approach to the identification and definition of interface services and protocols for future robotic spacecraft. Hardware-in-the loop (HiL) demonstration results are outlined based on the implementation of selected end-to-end services. The developed communication interface is intended to facilitate the command, control and monitoring of classic satellites as well as attached robotic devices and robotic mobile platforms. Both system autonomy and distributed mission architectures are promoted. Based on an initial state-of-the-art review of current and past robotic space missions, required capabilities with respect to communication, levels of robotic control and autonomy were investigated. Thereof derived, a general categorization of possible robotic missions was developed, including the definition of roles, responsibilities and major use cases. By applying a hierarchical mission composition, a definition of functional classes and a classification of autonomy levels, a systematic and holistic categorization could be found to the definition of the required services. The concept can be applied to arbitrary hardware and deal as a standard for on-board, spacecraft-to-spacecraft and ground-spacecraft communication. Subsequently, suitable technologies for the definition and implementation of these services were analyzed and a conceptual architecture was developed. As underlying communication protocols and architectures, various options have been evaluated. A disruption-tolerant network (DTN)-based solution was chosen, however, the defined services can work over a variety of different communication protocols. For demonstration purposes, a subset was implemented within the METERON operations environment (MOE) [17] and demonstrated with two different robotic devices, a 7-degrees of freedom (DoF) dexterous manipulator and a samplecollecting rover mockup. The experiments showed that the developed architecture can successfully be used to control robotic manipulators and rovers over DTN in a standardized way.
... Another field where multirobot systems have been recently applied is in bi-manual manipulation [18], in which more than one robot operate simultaneously to achieve a single goal. For instance, a robot holds a manipulated object while a second robot acts on it. ...
The use of multiple robots working cooperatively in a redundant way offers new possibilities in the execution of complex tasks in dynamic workspaces. The aim of this work is to increase the range of applicability of teleoperated systems by means of the automatic cooperation of multiple slave robots which, controlled by a human operator, act as if they were a unique robot: a Multi-Robot Cooperation Platform for Task-Oriented Teleoperation, MRCP. From the human operator commands, this robotic platform, the MRCP, dynamically selects the most suitable slave robot and manages, when necessary, a task transfer from one robot to another in order to achieve a smooth execution of teleoperated tasks. The result of the proposed methodology is an improved teleoperated system in terms of reachable workspace (volume, maneuverability and accessibility) and dexterity, thus widening its range of applicability. This approach allows human operators to focus their attention on the ongoing task more than on the teleoperated robots.
... However, this work exploits an existing humanoid robot, which may not have been specifically designed for the task being tackled. Zacharias et al. [5,6,7] plot the 3D cartesian position workspace by initially drawing spheres, whose color varies with the percentage of inverse kinematics solutions found for each point. Moreover, they propose to use different shapes at each point to represent orientations, depending on the feasible end-effector orientations at each position, but their later work also focuses on optimizing manipulation with a given bimanual robot, rather than deciding its arms configuration. ...
Bimanual manipulation of objects is receiving a lot of attention nowadays, but there is few literature addressing the design of the arms configuration. In this paper, we propose a way to analyze the relative positioning of two redundant arms, both equipped with spherical wrists, in order to obtain the best common workspace for grasping purposes. Considering the geometry of a robot with a spherical wrist, the Cartesian workspace can be discretized, with an easy representation of the feasible end-effector orientations at each point using bounding cones. After having characterized the workspace for one robot arm, we can evaluate how good each of the discretized poses relate with an identical arm in another position with a quality function that considers orientations. In the end, we obtain a quality value for each relative position of two arms, and we perform an optimization using genetic algorithms to obtain the best workspace for a cooperative task.
... The grid entries represent either a probability that a given pose that lies within the corresponding workspace voxel is reachable or binary information is used to indicate that a voxel lies (partly) within the reachable workspace. Extensions to bimanual applications have been presented in [35,42]. In [14] an ego-centered representation of the reachability of a humanoid robot's manipulator is learned autonomously. ...
Quantifying the robot's performance in terms of dexterity and maneuverability is essential for the analysis and design of novel robot mechanisms and for the selection of appropriate robot configurations in the context of grasping and manipulation. It can also be used for monitoring and evaluating the current robot state and support planning and decision making tasks, such as grasp selection or inverse kinematics (IK) computation. To this end, we propose an extension to the well-known Yoshikawa manipulability ellipsoid measure Yoshikawa (Int J Robotics Res 4(2):3-9, 1985), which incorporates constraining factors, such as joint limits or the self-distance between manipulator and other parts of the robot. Based on this measure we show how an extended capability representation of the robot's workspace can be built in order to support online queries like grasp selection or inverse kinematics solving. In addition to single handed grasping tasks, we discuss how the approach can be extended to bimanual grasping tasks. The proposed approaches are evaluated in simulation and we show how the extended manipulability measure is used within the grasping and manipulation pipeline of the humanoid robot ARMAR-III.
... Robot manipulation is a well studied field that has seen remarkable developments in the last 30 years [1][2][3][4]. Moreover, dual-arm robot manipulation has been widely investigated in the last decade [5][6][7][8][9][10][11][12][13][14][15][16]. Nevertheless, it still belongs to the most demanding challenges in robotics. ...
As robots are increasingly used in human-cluttered environments, the requirement of human-likeness in their movements becomes essential. Although robots perform a wide variety of demanding tasks around the world in factories, remote sites and dangerous environments, they are still lacking the ability to coordinate with humans in simple, every-day life bi-manual tasks, e.g. removing a jar lid. This paper focuses on the introduction of bio-inspired control schemes for robot arms that coordinate with human arms in bi-manual manipulation tasks. Using data captured from human subjects performing a variety of every-day bi-manual life tasks, we propose a bio-inspired controller for a robot arm, that is able to learn human inter- and intra-arm coordination during those tasks. We embed human arm coordination in low-dimension manifolds, and build potential fields that attract the robot to human-like configurations using the probability distributions of the recorded human data. The method is tested using a simulated robot arm that is identical in structure to the human arm. A preliminary evaluation of the approach is also carried out using an anthropomorphic robot arm in bi-manual manipulation task with a human subject.
