Joint-Space Kinematic Control of a Bionic Continuum Manipulator in Real-Time by Using Hybrid Approach

Continuum manipulators are a type of robot used for delicate applications, including safe human-robot interactions. Controlling these manipulators for an accurate trajectory, especially in the case of pneumatic actuation, is extremely challenging. Thus, this article proposes a real-time kinematic trajectory control of a pneumatically actuated multi-segment bionic continuum manipulator with a mobile base by combining a neural network and analytical model with a cascaded controller to overcome this challenge. The inverse kinematics solution of the multi-segment manipulator is developed by using a neural network and an inverse piecewise constant curvature approach. The neural network is trained by using a separate learning algorithm. Although hybrid inverse modeling gives better solutions than existing techniques, significant residual positional error of the manipulator tip remains due to inherent material hysteresis. Thus, a cascaded PI-controller is utilized to compensate for the residual positional error. The controller gains are updated in each step by predictions of the actuator length, where the Jacobian entries are computed from the neural network model. The proposed procedure is validated on Festo Didactics’ elephant trunk-like two-segment continuum manipulator, Robotino-XT. Three different cases are considered for real-time trajectory tracking, where the OptiTrack vision system is used for validation by tracking the manipulator tip pose. For the trajectory points outside the manipulator workspace, simultaneous trunk and base movements are used. In experimental validation, the proposed scheme is shown to give much reduced manipulator tip trajectory error as compared to the existing methods.