Manipulation at ill-conditioned configurations by a robot hand (employment of local and global dexterities)

Abstract

Object manipulation by the cooperative action of fingers using a robot hand involves a number of issues concerning the possible task singular configurations. This research framework investigates the concept of object manipulation by a four-fingered physically built robot hand. In particular, the structure of hybrid control for constrained dynamics with a possible ill-conditioned task configuration is considered. The employment of the hand dexterity measure based on individual finger measurements will be shown to be effective to manipulate an object even at singular task configuration. A Cartesian-based motion is mainly emphasized here; a Cartesian motion represents the natural mechanism of moving an object within the hand palm with advanced sensing techniques such as hand-eye kinematics coordination in an attempt to emulate human actions of grasping and manipulation.