Localizing external contact using proprioceptive sensors : the contact particle filter

In order for robots to interact safely and intelligently with their environment they must be able to reliably estimate and localize external contacts. This paper introduces the CPF, the Contact Particle Filter, which is a general algorithm for detecting and localizing external contacts on rigid body robots without the need for external sensing. The CPF finds external contact points that best explain the observed external joint torque, and returns sensible estimates even when the external torque measurement is corrupted with noise. We demonstrate the capability of the CPF in multiple scenarios. We show how it can track multiple external contacts on a simulated Atlas robot, and also perform extensive simulation and hardware experiments on a Kuka iiwa robot arm.

Department dc:contributor.department

Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science

Grantor dc:publisher

Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Year dc:date.issued

2018

Author dc:creator

• Manuelli, Lucas, Ph. D. Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Advisor dc:contributor.advisor

• Russ Tedrake.

• Electrical Engineering and Computer Science.

Statement dc:rights

• MIT theses are protected by copyright. They may be viewed, downloaded, or printed from this source but further reproduction or distribution in any format is prohibited without written permission.

Licence dc:rights.uri

• http://dspace.mit.edu/handle/1721.1/7582

Language dc:language.iso

eng

Handle dc:identifier.uri

http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/115739

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:dspace.mit.edu:1721.1/115739