September 22, 2011 - Sami Haddadin

Title: Next Generation Robots: From Robotic Co-Workers and Service Assistants to Human-Inspired Robot Design

Abstract:
Recently, robots have gained capabilities in both sensing and actuation, which enable operation in the proximity of humans. Even direct physical interaction has become possible without suffering from decrease in speed and payload. However, it is clear that these human-friendly robots will look very different from today’s industrial ones. Rich sensory information, lightweight design, and soft-robotics features are required to reach the expected performance and safety during interaction with humans or in unknown environments. In this talk I will give an overview about my research topics at DLR that aim at solving these long-term challenges. The first part of my talk deals with the realization of sensor based co-workers/servants that bring robots closer to humans and enable close cooperation with them. I will describe our design methodologies, biomechanical safety analysis, exteroceptive sensing methods, control and motion algorithms, the developed HRI schemes, and several applications that benefit form the achieved advances. The second part of the talk covers variable impedance actuation that implements soft-robotics features mainly in hardware.

Based on the design and control ideas of actively controlled compliant systems we intend to outperform this mature technology with new variable stiffness systems. I will present the overall design ideas, the recently built hand-arm system, and novel control concepts that aim at exploiting the natural dynamics of these systems.