Integrated sensing and control of mobile manipulators

The paper proposes, an integrated sensing and control framework for autonomous mobile manipulators. First, the mobile manipulator is considered as a redundant robot, while a unified dynamic model for an integrated mobile platform and on-board manipulator are developed. Combining the event-based planning and control method with a nonlinear feedback technique, a task level action controller is designed and an online kinematic redundancy resolution scheme is developed. Secondly, a force/torque sensor and a laser range sensor are used for the mobile manipulator to interact with objects and the environment. A nonholonomic cart pushing task has demonstrated the advantages of the integrated sensing and control approach of a mobile manipulator. The sensing and control approaches are tested on a mobile manipulator consisting of a Nomadic XR4000 and a Puma 560 robot arm.