Kinematics and Trajectory Planning

This chapter addresses human hand anatomy, the problems of forward kinematics, inverse kinematics, differential kinematics, and trajectory planning. The joints of thumb and four fingers contain two saddle‐shaped articulating surfaces between two bones and is4 classified as saddle joints. Index, middle, ring, and little fingers include three revolute joints in order to do the angular movements. Kinematics is restricted to a natural geometrical description of motion, including positions, orientations, and their derivatives. A general systematic method needs to be derived to define the relative position and orientation of two consecutive links to calculate the forward kinematic equations for a serial n‐link revolute‐joint manipulator. The maximum joint angles of each joint depend on different individuals. It is necessary to know the desired paths before the robotic hand is controlled to execute a specific hand motion task.