Planning algorithms are impacting technical disciplines and industries around the world, including robotics, computer-aided design, manufacturing, computer graphics, aerospace applications, drug design, and protein folding. This coherent and comprehensive book unifies material from several sources, including robotics, control theory, artificial intelligence, and algorithms. The treatment is centered on robot motion planning but integrates material on planning in discrete spaces. A major part of the book is devoted to planning under uncertainty, including decision theory, Markov decision processes, and information spaces, which are the “configuration spaces” of all sensor-based planning problems. The last part of the book delves into planning under differential constraints that arise when automating the motions of virtually any mechanical system. Developed from courses taught by the author, the book is intended for students, engineers, and researchers in robotics, artificial intelligence, and control theory as well as computer graphics, algorithms, and computational biology.

Planning Algorithms: Introductory Material

Preface. 1. Introduction. 2. Rigid Motions and Homogeneous Transformations. 3. Forward and Inverse Kinematics. 4. Velocity Kinematics-The Jacobian. 5. Path and Trajectory Planning. 6. Independent Joint Control. 7. Dynamics. 8. Multivariable Control. 9. Force Control. 10. Geometric Nonlinear Control. 11. Computer Vision. 12. Vision-Based Control. Appendix A: Trigonometry. Appendix B: Linear Algebra. Appendix C: Dynamical Systems. Appendix D: Lyapunov Stability. Index.

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Robot Modeling and Control

Paper: The internal model principle of control theory

Human skin is a remarkable organ. It consists of an integrated, stretchable network of sensors that relay information about tactile and thermal stimuli to the brain, allowing us to maneuver within our environment safely and effectively. Interest in large-area networks of electronic devices inspired by human skin is motivated by the promise of creating autonomous intelligent robots and biomimetic prosthetics, among other applications. The development of electronic networks comprised of flexible, stretchable, and robust devices that are compatible with large-area implementation and integrated with multiple functionalities is a testament to the progress in developing an electronic skin (e-skin) akin to human skin. E-skins are already capable of providing augmented performance over their organic counterpart, both in superior spatial resolution and thermal sensitivity. They could be further improved through the incorporation of additional functionalities (e.g., chemical and biological sensing) and desired properties (e.g., biodegradability and self-powering). Continued rapid progress in this area is promising for the development of a fully integrated e-skin in the near future.

25th Anniversary Article: The Evolution of Electronic Skin (E-Skin): A Brief History, Design Considerations, and Recent Progress

This book, written by two major figures in adaptive control, provides a wealth of material for researchers, practitioners, and students. While some researchers in adaptive control may note the absence of a particular topic, the book‘s scope represents a high-gain instrument. It can be used by designers of control systems to enhance their work through the information on many new theoretical developments, and can be used by mathematical control theory specialists to adapt their research to practical needs. The book is strongly recommended to anyone interested in adaptive control.

Adaptive Control

This paper presents the process of virtual prototype development and simulation results for a novel tracked hybrid mobile robot that was designed based on hybridization of the mobile platform and manipulator arm as one entity for robot locomotion as well as manipulation. The novel mechanical design paradigm is analyzed with the aid of a virtual prototype that was developed with Adams Software along with Adams Tracked Vehicle (ATV) Toolkit for multi- body dynamic motion simulations of the complete robotic system. The simulation results were used to study the robot's mobility characteristics through animations of different possible tasks that require various locomotion and manipulation capabilities. The ability to visualize and validate various robot mobility cases and to study its functionality in the early design stages aided in optimizing the design and hence dramatically reduce physical prototype development time and cost. The design optimization process also involved optimal weight optimization and proper component selection. Moreover, the simulations enabled us to define motor torque requirements and maximize end-effector payload capacity for different robot configurations. Visualization of the mobile robot on different types of virtual terrains such as flat roads, obstacles, stairs, ditches, and ramps, helped in determining the mobile robot's expected performance and specify optimal specifications in the early design stages and ongoing construction of the first physical prototype.

Virtual Prototype Development and Simulations of a Tracked Hybrid Mobile Robot

In clinical practice, magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) is used to locate a lesion/tumor for bone biopsy in children. However, there is a lack of MR-compatible tools that can be used simultaneously during imaging and biopsy while maintaining surgical accuracy and safety. The Pediatric Surgery Robot (PSR) platform is a 5-DOF robot with a modular tool interface. For the case of bone biopsy, a Bone Biopsy Tooling (BBT) is attached. It is designed to fit within a Philips Achieva 3.0T MRI bore and carry a modified titanium bone biopsy needle. A surgical pre-planning and control interface has been developed for joint and Cartesian level control. The PSR-BBT has demonstrated 1.65 +/-1.77 mm accuracy in Cartesian control in free space. The PSR-BBT can generate 12.46 +/- 0.32 N of axial force while drilling at a speed of 30 rpm, which is sufficient for cortical and cancellous bone phantoms. Under MRI testing (T1-FFE, T1-SE, T2-FFE and T2-TSE scans), the system demonstrated less than 33% signal-to-noise ratio variation while drilling and a 0.46% geometric distortion while powered on without significantly impacting MRI guidance in situ. These results show that the PSR-BBT can allow the user to simultaneously image and perform the biopsy and presents the PSR as a viable platform for MR-guided robotic surgery.

Development and Validation of MRI Compatible Pediatric Surgical Robot with Modular Tooling for Bone Biopsy

The paper addresses the problem of end effector trajectory planning and control of seven degrees of freedom (DOF) kinematically redundant robots An off-line optimal continuous path planning method is developed for on-line control at joint level The specified end effector path is approximated by a set of location nodes selected on the desired path The motion control of the robot is provided by cubic polynomial interpolation at joint level The proposed approach to trajectory planning of kinematically redundant robots consists of obtaining an optimal set of nodes which guarantees minimum deviation from the desired Cartesian path The redundant DOF of the robot is used as a constrained variable in the optimization search The method is illustrated in an example

Optimal Continuous Path Planning for Seven-Degrees-of-Freedom Robots

Analysis and design of a robotic electrooptical distance sensor, based on the phase-shift measurement of a modulated light intensity, is addressed in this article. The transducer of this sensor employs two light sources (light-emitting diodes), whose intensities are modulated by different-phase sine-wave signals, and one photodiode receiver. The distance of an object's surface with respect to the sensor is measured by investigating the received phase shift. The experimental set-up of the sensor, used in this research, was designed and manufactured such that various mechanical and electronic design parameters could be investigated independently. Experiments undertaken show that these parameters indeed affect the performance of the sensor. The exemplary optimization analysis carried out considered only two performance aspects of the sensor, namely, sensitivity and operational range, and yielded corresponding optimal design parameters. The optimal distance sensor analyzed illustrated that it has sufficient resolution to be useful for most existing industrial robots.

Analysis and design of a robotic distance sensor

A new method aiming at reducing peak torques is developed in this paper for kinematically redundant manipulators. The method considers the contributions of both velocity and acceleration to the joint torque. Instead of minimizing the joint torque or kinetic energy at the current station, the method always uses the current torque to approach an optimum velocity of the following station, which, along with joint acceleration, minimizes the torque of the following station, while at the same time keeps the current torque within the limits. Simulations are conducted and the results show the clear superiority of the proposed method over the torque optimization method (Hollerbach & Suh 1987) and the energy minimization method (Khatib 1983).

Andrew A. Goldenberg

Papers

Virtual Prototype Development and Simulations of a Tracked Hybrid Mobile Robot

Development and Validation of MRI Compatible Pediatric Surgical Robot with Modular Tooling for Bone Biopsy

Optimal Continuous Path Planning for Seven-Degrees-of-Freedom Robots

Analysis and design of a robotic distance sensor

Peak torque reduction with redundant manipulators