I-Corps: Collaborative robotics using discrete variable stiffness actuators

这个I-Corps项目的更广泛的影响/商业潜力是开发协作机器人操纵器，以充分利用人类智能和机器人的精度和力量来提高工业性能和安全性。拟议的技术旨在通过使用协作机器人机械手来补充其劳动力，以支持制造业实现制造过程自动化。这项技术可能会加速制造业采用协作机器人，以补充技术工人的不足，并将工人从重复和危险的任务中解放出来，以提高制造效率，减少事故。除了制造应用外，这种下一代合规合作机器人还可以应用于物流，军事服务，医疗保健，家庭伴侣，教育和其他应用。 这个I-Corps项目是基于使用离散变刚度致动器的协作机器人操作器的开发，该致动器提供人类安全和机器人性能。 目前，现有的可变刚度致动器依赖于连续刚度变化机构。 所提出的技术带来了一种离散的设计方法，用于快速刚度水平选择、低功耗、刚度变化中的零反向驱动力和紧凑设计。 此外，所提出的致动器提供了一个独特的解决方案，为下一代兼容的机器人操作器，可以平衡人类的安全性（低刚度）和机器人的性能（高刚度），使用代表性的刚度水平的快速切换的发展。建议的柔顺致动器可以应用于机器人工业的部门，这些部门需要通过可变刚度实现自适应柔顺动力学，如步行机器人，外骨骼，医疗和教育机器人与人-机器人物理交互。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

The broader impact/commercial potential of this I-Corps project is the development of collaborative robot manipulators to allow full use of human intelligence and robotic precision and strength to improve industrial performance and safety. The proposed technology seeks to support manufacturing industries in automating their manufacturing processes by using collaborative robotic manipulators to complement their workforce. The proposed technology may speed up the adoption of co-robots in manufacturing industries to supplement the lack of skilled workers and release workers from repetitive and dangerous tasks to increase manufacturing efficiency with fewer accidents. In addition to manufacturing applications, this next generation of compliant co-robots also may be applied to logistics, military service, medical care, home companions, education, and other applications. This I-Corps project is based on the development of collaborative robot manipulators using discrete variable stiffness actuators that provide both human safety and robotic performance. Currently, existing variable stiffness actuators rely on continuous stiffness change mechanisms. The proposed technology brings a discrete design methodology for fast stiffness level selection, low power consumption, zero back driving force in stiffness change, and compact design. In addition, the proposed actuators provide a unique solution for the development of next generation of compliant robotic manipulators that may balance human safety (low stiffness) and robotic performance (high stiffness) using fast switching of representative stiffness levels. The proposed compliant actuators may be applied to sectors of the robotics industry that require adaptable compliant dynamics enabled by variable stiffness such as walking robots, exoskeletons, medical and educational robotics with human-robot physical interactions.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.