How to Model Tendon-Driven Continuum Robots and Benchmark Modelling Performance

Kinematic Model and Workspace Analysis of Tendon-driven Continuum Robots

Continuum robots have excited increasing attention and effort from robotic community due to their high dexterity and safety. This paper designs a continuum robot equipped with an elastic backbone structure and tendon-driven system. The kinematic model of such robot is formulated and a novel approach to analyze the workspace is developed by identifying the interference between the backbone struc...

Performance Control of Tendon-Driven Endoscopic Surgical Robots With Friction and Hysteresis

In this study, a new position control scheme for the tendon-sheath mechanism (TSM) which is used in flexible medical devices is presented. TSM is widely used in dexterous robotic applications because it can flexibly work in limited space, in constrained environments, and provides efficient power transmission from the external actuator to the distal joint. However, nonlinearities from friction a...

Continuum Robots: An Approach to Safer Robots

There is a growing need for robots that can not only function in close proximity to human beings but also physically interact with them safely. This calls for a paradigm shift in the way robots are designed. Towards this end, we propose the use of continuum robots to improve safety in physical human robot interaction (pHRI). Continuum robots have been looked at in the past for applications whic...

SIMBA: Tendon-Driven Modular Continuum Arm with Soft Reconfigurable Gripper

In this paper, we describe the conceptual design and implementation of the Soft Compliant Manipulator for Broad Applications (SIMBA) manipulator, which is designed and developed for participating in the RoboSoft Grand Challenge 2016. In our novel design, we have proposed (1) a modular continuum arm with independent actuation units for each module, to increase maintainability; (2) a soft reconfi...

Minimally invasive force sensing for tendon-driven robots