Task-space bilateral teleoperation systems for heterogeneous robots with time-varying delays

Comparison of Semi-autonomous Mobile Robot Control Strategies in Presence of Large Delay Fluctuation

We propose semi-autonomous control strategies to assist in the teleoperation of mobile robots under unstable communication conditions. A short-term autonomous control system is the assistance in the semi-autonomous control strategies, when the teleoperation is compromised. The short-term autonomous control comprises of lateral and longitudinal functions. The lateral control is based on an artificial potential field method where obstacles are repulsive, and a route is attractive. LiDAR-based artificial potential field methods are well studied. We present a novel artificial potential field method based on color and depth images. Benefit of a camera system compared to a LiDAR is that a camera detects color, is cheaper, and does not have moving parts. Moreover, utilization of active sensors is not desired in the particle accelerator environment. A set of experiments with a robot prototype are carried out to validate this system. The experiments are carried out in an environment which mimics the accelerator tunnel environment. The difficulty of the teleoperation is altered with obstacles. Fully manual and autonomous control are compared with the proposed semi-autonomous control strategies. The results show that the teleoperation is improved with autonomous, delay-dependent, and control-dependent assist compared to the fully manual control. Based on the operation time, control-dependent assist performed the best, reducing the time by 12% on the tunnel section with most obstacles. The presented system can be easily applied to common industrial robots operating e.g. in warehouses or factories due to hardware simplicity and light computational demand.

Using a Redundant User Interface in Teleoperated Surgical Systems for Task Performance Enhancement

The enhanced dexterity and manipulability offered by master–slave teleoperated surgical systems have significantly improved the performance and safety of minimally invasive surgeries. However, effective manipulation of surgical robots is sometimes limited due to the mismatch between the slave and master robots’ kinematics and workspace. The purpose of this paper is first to formulate a quantifiable measure of the combined master–slave system manipulability. Next, we develop a null-space controller for the redundant master robot that employs the proposed manipulability index to enhance the performance of teleoperation tasks by matching the kinematics of the redundant master robot with the kinematics of the slave robot. The null-space controller modulates the redundant degrees of freedom of the master robot to reshape its manipulability ellipsoid (ME) towards the ME of the slave robot. The ME is the geometric interpretation of the kinematics of a robot. By reshaping the master robot’s manipulability, we match the master and slave robots’ kinematics. We demonstrate that by using a redundant master robot, we are able to enhance the master–slave system manipulability and more intuitively transfer the slave robot’s dexterity to the user. Simulation and experimental studies are performed to validate the performance of the proposed control strategy. Results demonstrate that by employing the proposed manipulability index, we can enhance the user’s control over the force/velocity of a surgical robot and minimize the user’s control effort for a teleoperated task.

A Novel Switching-Based Control Framework for Improved Task Performance in Teleoperation System With Asymmetric Time-Varying Delays

This paper addresses the adaptive control for task-space teleoperation systems with constrained predefined synchronization error, where a novel switched control framework is investigated. Based on multiple Lyapunov-Krasovskii functionals method, the stability of the resulting closed-loop system is established in the sense of state-independent input-to-output stability. Compared with previous work, the developed method can simultaneously handle the unknown kinematics/dynamics, asymmetric varying time delays, and prescribed performance control in a unified framework. It is shown that the developed controller can guarantee the prescribed transient-state and steady-state synchronization performances between the master and slave robots, which is demonstrated by the simulation study.

Adaptive Control of Semi-Autonomous Teleoperation System With Asymmetric Time-Varying Delays and Input Uncertainties

This paper addresses the adaptive task-space bilateral teleoperation for heterogeneous master and slave robots to guarantee stability and tracking performance, where a novel semi-autonomous teleoperation framework is developed to ensure the safety and enhance the efficiency of the robot in remote site. The basic idea is to stabilize the tracking error in task space while enhancing the efficiency of complex teleoperation by using redundant slave robot with subtask control. To unify the study of the asymmetric time-varying delays, passive/nonpassive exogenous forces, dynamic parameter uncertainties and dead-zone input in the same framework, a novel switching technique-based adaptive control scheme is investigated, where a special switched error filter is developed. By replacing the derivatives of position errors with their filtered outputs in the coordinate torque design, and employing the multiple Lyapunov-Krasovskii functionals method, the complete closed-loop master (slave) system is proven to be state-independent input-to-output stable. It is shown that both the position tracking errors in task space and the adaptive parameter estimation errors remain bounded for any bounded exogenous forces. Moreover, by using the redundancy of the slave robot, the proposed teleoperation framework can autonomously achieve additional subtasks in the remote environment. Finally, the obtained results are demonstrated by the simulation.