Abstract: A robot, such as a bipedal robot, that includes three or more rigid links such as two legs and a pelvis. The robot includes joints pivotally connecting pairs of the rigid links and an actuator associated with each of the joints. The robot includes a universal balancing controller with an output feedback control module providing control signals to selectively drive the actuators to balance the robot on a support element which may be configured to provide a dynamic, unstable environment or to provide a static, stable environment. During use, the control signals are generated in response to processing of global robot data from sensors associated with the rigid links or the joints. The control signals are generated by the output feedback control module without any need for measurements of the support element or without any measurement of a dynamic environment.

Abstract: A controller for floating-base humanoid robots that can track motion capture data while maintaining balance. Briefly, the controller includes a proportional-derivative (PD) controller that is adapted to compute the desired acceleration to track a given reference trajectory at every degree-of-freedom (DOF) of the robot including the six unactuated ones of the floating base. Second, the controller includes a component (joint torque optimization module) that computes the optimal joint torques and contact forces to realize the desired accelerations given by the first component (i.e., the PD controller). The joint torque optimization module performs this computation considering the full-body dynamics of the robot and the constraints on contact forces. The desired accelerations may not be feasible for the robot due to limits in normal contact forces and friction (e.g., the robot sometimes cannot exactly copy or perform the modeled human motion defined by motion capture data).

Abstract: A robot, such as a bipedal robot, that includes three or more rigid links such as two legs and a pelvis. The robot includes joints pivotally connecting pairs of the rigid links and an actuator associated with each of the joints. The robot includes a universal balancing controller with an output feedback control module providing control signals to selectively drive the actuators to balance the robot on a support element which may be configured to provide a dynamic, unstable environment or to provide a static, stable environment. During use, the control signals are generated in response to processing of global robot data from sensors associated with the rigid links or the joints. The control signals are generated by the output feedback control module without any need for measurements of the support element or without any measurement of a dynamic environment.

Abstract: A controller for floating-base humanoid robots that can track motion capture data while maintaining balance. Briefly, the controller includes a proportional-derivative (PD) controller that is adapted to compute the desired acceleration to track a given reference trajectory at every degree-of-freedom (DOF) of the robot including the six unactuated ones of the floating base. Second, the controller includes a component (joint torque optimization module) that computes the optimal joint torques and contact forces to realize the desired accelerations given by the first component (i.e., the PD controller). The joint torque optimization module performs this computation considering the full-body dynamics of the robot and the constraints on contact forces. The desired accelerations may not be feasible for the robot due to limits in normal contact forces and friction (e.g., the robot sometimes cannot exactly copy or perform the modeled human motion defined by motion capture data).