Mobile manipulator

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A mobile manipulator is a robot system built from a robotic manipulator arm mounted on a mobile platform.

Contents

Description

Mobile Manipulator systems; mobile platform, robot manipulator, vision and tooling Mobile manipulator systems.png
Mobile Manipulator systems; mobile platform, robot manipulator, vision and tooling

A mobile manipulation system combines the mobility offered by a mobile platform and dexterity offered by the manipulator. The mobile platform offers an extended workspace to the manipulator and more degrees of freedom to operate in. However, the operation of such a system is challenging because of the many degrees of freedom and the unstructured environment that it performs in. A system is generally composed of the mobile platform, the robotic manipulator arm, vision components, and tooling components.

Use Cases

Mobile manipulation is a subject of focus in development and research environments. Mobile manipulators, either autonomous or remote operated, are used in many areas, such as space exploration, military operations, home care and health care. Within the industrial field, the implementation of mobile manipulators has been limited. The necessary technology entities (mobile platforms, robot manipulators, vision, and tooling) are, to a large extent, available from off-the-shelf components. [1]

Few implementations of mobile robots in the industrial field have been reported due to the center of attention being drawn on optimization of the individual technologies, especially robot manipulators [2] and tooling, [3] while the integration, use, and application have been neglected in the field of industrial mobile manipulation. This means that few implementations of mobile robots, in production environments, have been reported – e.g. [4] and. [5]

Timeline

PAL Robotics' mobile manipulator TIAGo++ Robot. TIAGo++ side.jpg
PAL Robotics' mobile manipulator TIAGo++ Robot.
RB-1 developed by Robotnik Automation RB-1.png
RB-1 developed by Robotnik Automation
YearRobot nameCompany / Research Institute
1996Hilare 2bis LAAS-CNRS, France Flag of France.svg
2000JaumeRobotic Intelligence Lab, Jaume I University, Spain Flag of Spain.svg
2004FAuStO University of Verona, Italy Flag of Italy.svg
2006MM-500Neobotix GmbH, Germany Flag of Germany.svg
2009Little HelperDepartment of Production, Aalborg University, Denmark Flag of Denmark.svg
2012G-WAM Robotnik Automation & Barrett Technologies, Spain Flag of Spain.svg & United States Flag of the United States.svg
2012Human Support Robot (HSR) [6] Toyota, Japan
2013UBR-1Unbounded Robotics, United States Flag of the United States.svg
2013X-WAM Robotnik Automation & Barrett Technologies, Spain Flag of Spain.svg & United States Flag of the United States.svg
2015CARLoSAIMEN, Spain Flag of Spain.svg
2015RB-1 Robotnik Automation & Kinova Robotics, Spain Flag of Spain.svg & Canada Flag of Canada (Pantone).svg
2016TIAGo [7] PAL Robotics, Spain Flag of Spain.svg
2018MuR 205Institute of Assembly Technology, Leibniz University Hanover, Germany Flag of Germany.svg

Video Example

Mobile Manipulator: Little Helper - Aalborg University Mobilrobot 02.jpg
Mobile Manipulator: Little Helper – Aalborg University

One recent example is the mobile manipulator "Little Helper" from the Department of Production at Aalborg University. [8]

See also

Notes and references

  1. M. Hvilshøj, S. Bøgh, O. Madsen and M. Kristiansen: The Mobile Robot “Little Helper”: Concepts, ideas and working principles, 14th IEEE International Conference on Emerging Technologies and Factory Automation, 2009
  2. A. Albu-Schäffer, S. Haddadin, C. Ott, A. Stemmer, T. Wimböck and G. Hirzinger: The DLR lightweight robot: design and control concepts for robots in human environments, Industrial Robot, vol. 34, no. 5, pp. 376–385, 2007
  3. H. Liu, P. Meusel, G. Hirzinger, M. Jin and Y. X. Liu: The Modular Multisensory DLR-HIT-Hand: Hardware and Software Architecture, IEEE/ASME Transactions on Mechatronics, vol. 13, no. 4, pp. 461–469, 2008
  4. A. Stopp, S. Horstmann, S. Kristensen and F. Lohnert: Towards Interactive Learning for Manufacturing Assistant, IEEE Transactions on Industrial Electronics, pp. 705–707, 2003
  5. E. Helms, R. D. Schraft and M. Hägele: rob@work: Robot assistant in industrial environments, Proceedings in IEEE International Workshop on Robot and Human Interactive Communication, pp. 399–404, 2002
  6. Yamamoto, Takashi; Terada, Koji; Ochiai, Akiyoshi; Saito, Fuminori; Asahara, Yoshiaki; Murase, Kazuto (2019). "Development of Human Support Robot as the research platform of a domestic mobile manipulator". ROBOMECH Journal. 6: 1–15. doi: 10.1186/s40648-019-0132-3 . S2CID   148563252.
  7. Pages, Jordi; Marchionni, Luca; Ferro, Francesco (15 April 2016). "TIAGo: the modular robot that adapts to different research needs" (PDF). Retrieved 15 April 2016.
  8. Research project; Industrial maturation and exploitation of mobile manipulators – more info: MachineVision.dk


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