Control hardware integration of a biped humanoid robot with an android head

Abstract

The KAIST HUBO team and the Hanson Robotics team jointly developed an android-type humanoid robot termed Albert HUBO, which may be the world’s first robot that incorporates an expressive human face on a walking biped robot. Albert HUBO adopts the techniques of the HUBO design for the body of Albert HUBO and uses technology from Hanson Robotics for the head. The head and the body are two independent systems that use different computers to control each system. The head uses RC servo motors for facial expressions. It is controlled using a PC that utilizes RS232 communication. The head PC also processes vocal and visual information. The body (including the arms, fingers, legs, and torso) PC controls walking and body movements. It is connected via CAN communication to body servo controllers. The PCs are connected by RS232, which is able to transfer command data to each system. The height and weight of Albert HUBO are 137 cm and 57 kg, respectively. The robot has 66 DOFs (31 for the head motions and 35 for the body motions). The head part uses a material known as ‘Frubber’, which serves as a smooth human-like skin. In the head, 28 servo motors for facial movements and three servo motors for neck movements are used to generate a full range of facial expressions; thus, the robot is able to laugh, act surprised, and express sadness or anger. The body is modified from HUBO (KHR-3), which was introduced in 2004, and is joined with the head of Albert HUBO with 35 DC motors that are embedded for the purpose of imitating various human-like body motions. The biped humanoid robot with a human-like android head was realized by integrating two independent systems as a self-contained robotic system. The integration of the two systems is in the topic of this paper.