Simulation, Design and Control of a Soft Robotic Arm with Integrated Bending Sensing

摘要

The utilization of soft robotic arms/fingers, which are inherently safe and passively compliant, has been an active research area in robotics. This paper studies a rigid robotic arm and compliant soft gripper with integrated sensing and control for use in object manipulation tasks. A brief outline of the method used to implement the approximate soft mechanics of a compliant gripper within the rigid-body simulation of Gazebo [1] is described, followed by the implementation of the embedded strain sensors required for the sensing of the soft gripper within ROS [2]. A further method of soft gripper pose estimation, making use of the embedded sensor readings and a model-based approach, is then described, and implemented, within ROS and evaluated to gain an approximate understanding of how the method performs within a simulation environment and possibly in real use cases. Many avenues for further research may stem from this project, including further evaluation across wider use cases, additional systems built upon the pose estimations acquired and whether the method is feasible in real use cases when used in conjunction with a physical gripper.