EAGER: An Inexpensive Tactile Fingertip for Dexterous Manipulation

EAGER：用于灵巧操作的廉价触觉指尖

• 批准号: 1952598
• 负责人: Kevin Lynch
• 金额: $ 5.16万
• 依托单位: Northwestern University
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2020
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2020-01-01 至 2020-09-30
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=1952598&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: EAGER; Inexpensive; Tactile; Fingertip; Dexterous

Robot hands fall short of the dexterity of human hands for several reasons. One reason is the lack of affordable high-performance contact and force sensors to provide sensation at the fingertips. This project is to develop a new inexpensive fingertip for robot hands, with the goal of enhancing their dexterity.? Specifically, the new fingertip will incorporate a consumer-grade miniature camera and a flexure mount to deliver three characteristics that are promising for enhancing dexterous manipulation: (1) a well-characterized relationship between the force applied to the fingertip and its deflection (i.e., stiffness); (2) high-resolution contact location sensing; and (3) high-resolution measurement of the forces and torques applied by the fingertip. To achieve these characteristics, the project is broken into four tasks: (1) the design and testing of a compact six-degree-of-freedom (6-dof) flexure exhibiting low hysteresis and stress relaxation, providing a consistent mapping between wrenches (forces and torques) applied to the flexure and its 6-dof displacement; ?(2) visual estimation of the 6-dof flexure displacement by the embedded camera, with a target resolution of better than 100 microns in linear displacement; (3) bench tests of flexure displacement sensing, wrench sensing, and contact location sensing, using our custom 5-dof stress-strain test robot, which provides ground-truth force sensing resolution of better than 0.01 N and motion resolution of better than 1 micron (linear) and 0.001 degrees (angular); and (4) initial validation of the utility of the sensor for dexterous manipulation in single-finger tasks.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.

由于多种原因，机器人手的灵活性不如人手。原因之一是缺乏经济实惠的高性能接触和力传感器来提供指尖感觉。该项目旨在为机器人手开发一种新型廉价指尖，目的是提高它们的灵活性。具体来说，新的指尖将包含一个消费级微型相机和一个弯曲安装座，以提供有望增强灵巧操作的三个特性：（1）施加到指尖的力与其偏转之间的良好特征关系（即，刚性）; (2)高分辨率接触位置传感； (3) 高分辨率测量指尖施加的力和扭矩。为了实现这些特性，该项目分为四项任务：(1) 设计和测试紧凑型六自由度 (6-dof) 挠性件，该挠性件具有低滞后性和应力松弛特性，可在扳手之间提供一致的映射（作用于弯曲件及其 6 自由度位移的力和扭矩； （2）通过嵌入式相机对6自由度弯曲位移进行视觉估计，线性位移目标分辨率优于100微米； (3) 使用我们定制的五自由度应力应变测试机器人进行弯曲位移传感、扳手传感和接触位置传感的台架测试，其提供优于 0.01 N 的地面真实力传感分辨率和优于 1 的运动分辨率微米（线性）和 0.001 度（角度）； (4) 初步验证传感器在单指任务中灵巧操作的实用性。该奖项反映了 NSF 的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力优点和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。