The research objective of this award is development of a comprehensive theory and a systematic methodology for design of robotic mechanisms with which human users interact physically. These mechanisms are often designed to aid people with disabilities to perform common everyday tasks such as reaching or moving from one chair to another. Humans in general, and people with disabilities in particular, possess enormous variability in their capabilities and preferences, requiring such mechanisms to be flexibly adapted to functional variations. Solution of such problems often leads to mechanism configurations that do not conform to either the serial chain or fully parallel architectures that have historically been the focus of most studies in robotics. The research will combine fundamentals of kinematic theory, control theory and sensor design to achieve a comprehensive design methodology. The theory will be developed and the methodology will be validated through the design of examples of mechanisms intended to assist disabled individuals.
If successful, the results of this research will provide researchers with a design framework for mechanism design that incorporates human interaction as an integral part of the overall design objective. Because this research will accommodate alternate mechanism configurations, it has the potential to significantly improve our ability to design new human-assist devices. The systematic methodology will provide designers with the tools needed to incorporate the theory of mechanism design into the design process. A unique user interface for mechanism design, prototype design solutions, and documentation of the methodology will result from this research. The PI and research team will promote science and engineering education among grade school and high school students through presentations and demonstrations in his Stanford freshmen seminar course, the FIRST Robotics and FIRST Lego League programs. The project also includes international collaboration and exchange of personnel with a team at the Centre for Autonomous Systems at the University of Technology, Sydney, in Australia.
