Hand-arm coordination control for robotic interaction tasks

The focus of the research project is the problem of robotic hand-arm coordination for the purpose of manipulation. Hand-arm coordination refers to simultaneous movement of robotic manipulators (arms) and grippers (hands) during object manipulation. This is contrasted by rigid grasping used in most current robotic manipulation.

The objective is to enhance robots' overall performance by overcoming the limitations of rigid grasping by allowing and controlling motion of the grasped object. Controlled regrasping enables faster task execution and smoother operation by enhancing the manipulability of the whole arm-hand-object system throughout robots' tasks. Apart from resulting in higher efficiency of the robotic system, hand-arm coordination also results in more natural and intuitive looking robotic motion.

In broader terms, the aim of the project is to develop the most general, i.e., the most capable robotic controllers. The need for this comes from the desire of having robots work with and in human designed environments, and releasing the requirement for creating environments tailored to robots.