A general CPG network and its implementation on the microcontroller

Abstract

Over the last few years, it has been confirmed by the biologists that Central Pattern Generator (CPG) is the key mechanism of generating adaptive and versatile locomotion in animals. This gives a new inspiration of locomotion control for robots. Although the design of CPG controller using coupled oscillators has been proposed previously, it cannot comprehensively reproduce different rhythmic motion along with smooth transitions to mimic the versatility of animal locomotion. To tackle this problem, we propose a general CPG model emphasizing on its stability analysis, smooth transition and implementation architecture. Global exponential stability of the model is derived by using strict mathematical analysis. Transitions between different oscillating forms are also smooth, and the implementation architecture has low computational cost, thus suitable for microcontrollers. Moreover, all control parameters not only have clear relationships with the physical outputs, but also can be modified online. Both virtual and real robotic fish are developed to verify the effectiveness of our CPG controller together with the proposed implementation architecture, through the experiments of four locomotion gaits and three transitions among them.