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Improved Online Adjustment of Step Timing and Location for Legged Locomotion

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Abstract

Online step adaptation is critical for legged locomotion to resist disturbances, while current approaches mainly focus on step location regardless of step timing. This paper proposes an online adaptation algorithm that deals with both step timing and step location. A model predictive control framework is developed based on centroidal dynamics to predict robot state trajectories, which are utilized to simultaneously optimize step timing and location with full considerations on capturability, feasibility and reachability. Then, a swing foot trajectory generation method is presented to accommodate mutiple constraints on kinematics and actuators. Moreover, a heuristic compensation is enhanced to the step location for quadruped trotting locomotion, increasing the anti-disturbance ability of legged locomotion. Various push-recovery simulation and experiment on an 18 degree-of-freedom legged robot are implemented to verify the proposed algorithm.

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Funding

This paper was funded in part by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (grant number: 61903101), in part by the National Postdoctoral Program for Innovative Talents (grant number: BX201700064),in part by the China Postdoctoral Science Foundation (grant number: 2018M631933), and in part by the Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities (grant number: HIT.NSRIF.2020021).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Space Control and Inertial Technology Research Center, Harbin Institute of Technology, Harbin, 150001, People’s Republic of China

    Hao Sun, Junjie Yang, Hao An & Changhong Wang

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  1. Hao Sun
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  2. Junjie Yang
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  3. Hao An
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  4. Changhong Wang
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Contributions

List of all authors: Hao Sun, Junjie Yang, Hao An, Changhong Wang.

Hao An and Changhong Wang contributed to the idea of the proposed algorithm;

Hao Sun performed the experiment and wrote the manuscript;

Junjie Yang helped perform the analysis with constructive discussions.

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Correspondence to Hao An.

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Sun, H., Yang, J., An, H. et al. Improved Online Adjustment of Step Timing and Location for Legged Locomotion. J Intell Robot Syst 102, 37 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10846-021-01406-1

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