Load-bearing assessment for safe legged locomotion on collapsing terrain

• Grant number: 23/00249-0
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships abroad - Research Internship - Post-doctor
• Start date: April 30, 2023
• End date: April 29, 2024
• Field of knowledge: Interdisciplinary Subjects
• Principal Investigator: Marcelo Becker
• Grantee: Vivian Suzano Medeiros
• Supervisor: Claudio Carlo Semini
• Host Institution: Escola de Engenharia de São Carlos (EESC). Universidade de São Paulo (USP). São Carlos , SP, Brazil
• Institution abroad: Istituto Italiano di Tecnologia (IIT), Italy
• Associated to the scholarship: 21/05336-3 - Motion planning and control of legged robots for autonomous navigation in unstructured terrain, BP.PD

Abstract

The project goal is to develop a perceptive method to assess the terrain load-bearing limits for safe legged locomotion. Using torque and kinematic measurements from the robot's actuated joints, IMU data and visual feedback from onboard cameras, a traversability algorithm will assess the maximum force that can be applied to the terrain without risking collapse or tipover, and adjust the contact forces to comply with the estimated safety margins. This project combines perceptive and haptic measurements for safe autonomous navigation of quadrupedal robots in unstructured terrain, which will strongly contribute to the beneficiary's postdoctoral research. Furthermore, IIT has numerous resources and extensive experience with quadruped robots, which will allow experimental validation in different scenarios and with different robot sizes. (AU)