Musculoskeletal lower-limb robot driven by multifilament muscles

Abstract

This paper presents a redundant musculoskeletal robot using thin McKibben muscles that is based on human anatomy. The purpose of this robot is to achieve motions and characteristics that are very similar to a human body. We use a thin McKibben muscle, which is compliant and flexible, as the actuator of a musculoskeletal robot. Using a bundle of thin McKibben muscles, we develop a multifilament muscle that has characteristics similar to those of human muscles. In contrast, the actuators of conventional musculoskeletal robots are very heavy, not densely attached and have poor backdrivability. Because multifilament muscles are light and can be densely attached, we can attach them to the musculoskeletal robot as skeletal muscle and achieve a redundant system that is equivalent to a human drive mechanism. In this paper, we report a method for fabricating multifilament muscles that imitate various muscles, the development of a lower-limb muscle mechanism for the redundant musculoskeletal robot with thin McKibben muscles and experimental results showing that the proposed musculoskeletal robot achieves humanlike motions that have not yet been reported for other robots.

Low-voltage-driven soft actuators

“…There is a growing interest in future soft robotics, which are represented by highly compliant materials, flexibility, and good adaptability. [1][2][3] While the robots in the past were developed for repetitive labor, future robot technologies aim to enhance human's strength and ability with artificial intelligence; 4,5 for example, wearable exoskeletons. As one of the categories of wearable exoskeletons, wearable robotic orthoses have been in the spotlight in recent years for redefining our life in the 'homohundred' era.…”

Muscle textile to implement soft suit to shift balancing posture of the body

“…The muscle was extremely light, flexible, and thinner compared to the conventional McKibben-type artificial muscle. These features can help develop musculoskeletal robots [8] and robot arms [9].…”

Suction pad unit using a bellows pneumatic actuator as a support mechanism for an end effector of depalletizing robots

“…Various pneumatic actuators have been proposed [10][11][12][13][14][15][16][17][18][19][20][21][22][23][24]. McKibben-type artificial muscles [10][11][12][13][14] have the characteristic of expanding diametrically and contracting in the axial direction when pressurized. Flat tubes [15,16] deform in the diametrical direction when pressurized.…”