An open-architecture humanoid robot controller in support of developmental disability (DD) rehabilitation

The development of open-architecture humanoid robot controller for developmental disability (DD) rehabilitation, substituting the manufacturer controller is presented. This proposed architecture controller is made open to provide the knowledge of all the control structures as well as allow the developers to modify all the controller layers. The proposed open-architecture controller has four important layers, which are Task Layer, Integration Layer, Communication Layer and Physical Layer which will be explained further in this paper. The open-architecture controller was developed with a Raspberry Pi 2 using Python programming language along with other additional modules and peripherals to increase the robot's performance. A serial communication circuit is constructed to create the communication bridge between the humanoid robot's motors and proposed controller. The experimental results showed that the proposed open-architecture controller presented several advantages over the conventional controller. Despite that, further research works are necessary since the open-architecture humanoid robot controller is yet an on-going project in producing a robust open-architecture controller which consequently will further enhance the humanoid robot development and performance.