NRI: Collaborative Research: Unified Feedback Control and Mechanical Design for Robotic, Prosthetic, and Exoskeleton Locomotion

NRI：协作研究：机器人、假肢和外骨骼运动的统一反馈控制和机械设计

• 批准号: 1834557
• 负责人: Koushil Sreenath
• 金额: $ 18.21万
• 依托单位: University of California-Berkeley
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2018
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2018-01-01 至 2020-08-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=1834557&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: NRI; Collaborative; Research; Unified; Feedback

There is a pressing need for wearable robots, e.g., prostheses and exoskeletons, which improve the quality of life for individuals with limited mobility - devices that work symbiotically with human users to achieve stable, safe and efficient locomotion. At present, approximately 4.7 million people in the United States would benefit from an active lower-limb exoskeleton due to the effects of stroke, polio, multiple sclerosis, spinal cord injury, and cerebral palsy, and by 2050 an estimated 1.5 million people in the United States will be living with a major lower-limb amputation. Yet current wearable robotic devices do not address this growing population's needs since they are bulky, heavy, noisy, and require large batteries for even short duration use, while implementing predominately hierarchical control algorithms. Impeding innovation in this domain is the expensive and slow traditional design-build-test approach that ignores the tight coupling between hardware specifications and control algorithm performance. The vision of this work is to provide a methodology---inspired by advancements in robotic locomotion---that allows lower-limb prostheses and exoskeletons to meet real-world requirements through the co-design of the electromechanical and feedback systems. The transformative nature of this work, therefore, stems from its ability to realize wearable robots that synergize with humans to achieve increased mobility, providing a template for the growing robotic assistive device industry and potentially improving the quality of life of millions. To realize the vision of this work, the overarching research goal is to create a new unified control and design framework that will allow for the efficient and stable locomotion of robots, prostheses, and exoskeletons. A key aspect of this control methodology is the ability to continuously mediate between different objectives enforcing stability and safety in an efficient manner through force-based interactions among (wearable) robotic devices, their environment and the user. The resulting framework will be utilized via control-in-the-loop mechanical design of prostheses and exoskeletons with stringent design requirements, tested experimentally on a novel humanoid robot, and clinically evaluated through human subject trials. This work is, therefore, guided by the following specific goals: (1) develop a unified online optimization-based control framework for (wearable) robotic locomotion that efficiently mediates stability, safety and force constraints, (2) create a feedback loop between formal control synthesis and the mechanical design of wearable robots that satisfy stringent performance requirements, (3) accelerate clinical testing by translating controllers formally and experimentally from bipedal humanoid robots to prostheses and exoskeletons. As a result of these research goals, this work has the potential to create the next generation of robotic systems that enable stable, safe and efficient human mobility.

迫切需要可穿戴机器人，例如假肢和外骨骼，这些机器人可以改善行动不便的人的生活质量 - 与人类用户共同工作以实现稳定，安全和高效的运动。 目前，由于中风，脊髓灰质炎，多发性硬化症，脊髓损伤和大脑麻痹的影响，美国大约有470万人将受益于活跃的下limb外骨骼，到2050年，美国估计有150万人将患有主要较低的降低截止性。 然而，当前可穿戴的机器人设备无法满足这种不断增长的人群的需求，因为它们笨重，沉重，嘈杂，并且在短时间内甚至需要大量电池，同时实施了主要的层次控制算法。 阻碍该域中的创新是一种昂贵且缓慢的传统设计建筑测试方法，它忽略了硬件规格和控制算法性能之间的紧密耦合。 这项工作的愿景是提供一种受机器人运动进步的启发的方法---允许下限limb假体和外骨骼通过机电和反馈系统的共同设计满足现实世界的需求。 因此，这项工作的变革性质源于它实现与人类协同的可穿戴机器人实现提高移动性的能力，为不断增长的机器人辅助设备行业提供了模板，并有可能改善数百万的生活质量。 为了实现这项工作的愿景，总体研究目标是创建一个新的统一控制和设计框架，该框架将允许机器人，假肢和外骨骼的高效和稳定的运动。 这种控制方法的一个关键方面是能够通过（可穿戴）机器人设备，其环境和用户之间的基于力的相互作用在有效的方式以有效的方式执行稳定性和安全性之间连续中介。最终的框架将通过对植物和外骨骼的循环机械设计进行，具有严格的设计要求，在新型的类人动物机器人上进行了实验测试，并通过人类受试者试验进行了临床评估。 因此，这项工作受到以下特定目标的指导：（1）为（可穿戴）机器人运动开发一个统一的基于在线优化的控制框架，有效地介导了稳定性，安全性和力量限制，（2）在正式控制合成和可穿戴的机器人的机械型机器人的机械上，通过满足官方疗法的机械型（3）加速型（3），（3）的机械设计（3），（3）满足（3）的机械形式（3），（3）满足型官方的机械型（3）。机器人的假肢和外骨骼。 由于这些研究目标，这项工作有可能创建下一代的机器人系统，从而实现稳定，安全有效的人类流动性。