Lumped-Driven Method for Motion Control

This chapter proposes motion control method for deformable machines consisting of actively deformable materials. If the problem is stated in inverse dynamics form, the required method is to move typical position of the robot on the objective trajectory by deforming its whole body. It was neither the selection of typical points nor objective trajectory was clear for the beginning. 

A variety of motions of gel robots is derived by applying either spatially or time varying electric fields in the previous chapters. Both spatially and time alternating electric fields were not yet applied to them. For the purpose of generating turning over motion, both spatially varying time alternating electric fields are applied to them. Typical operators of electric fields are applied and switched to gel robots. This work is the first step towards motion control of gel robots and deformable machines in the future. 

This chapter was adapted from in part, by permission, M. Otake, Y. Kagami, M. Inaba, and H. Inoue, Motion design of a starfish-shaped gel robot made of electroactive polymer gel , Robotics and Autonomous Systems, vol. 40, pp. 185-191, 2002 M. Otake, Y. Kagami, Y. Krmiyoshi, M. Inaba, and H. Inoue, Inverse Dynamics of Gel Robots made of Electroactive Polymer Gel , Proceedings of IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation, pp.2299-2304, 2003. 

Otake Electroactive Polymer Gel Robots, STAR 59, pp. 165—199. springerlink.com (c) Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 2010 

Common approach to generate motion is to define series of pose and connect them with dynamically stable trajectory. This approach cannot be applied to gel robots. We cannot predefine series of pose because we cannot control their poses directly. Motion control problem of deformable machine made of actively deformable materials are classified into three, which are summarized below. 

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