This paper describes the development of a system for dexterous telemanipu-lation and presents the results of tests involving simple manipulation tasks. The user wears an instrumen-ted glove augmented with an arm-grounded haptic feedback apparatus. A linkage attached to the user’s wrist measures gross motions of the arm. The movements of the user are transferred to a two fingered dexterous robot hand mounted on the end of a 4-DOF industrial robot arm. Forces measured at the robot fingers can be transmitted back to the user via the haptic feedback apparatus. The results obtained in blockstacking and object-rolling experiments indicate that the addition of force feedback to the user did not improve the speed of task execution. In fact, in some cases the presence of incomplete force information is detrimen-tal to performance speed compared to no force information. There are indications that the presence of force feedback did aid in task learning.

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A robotic grasping manipulator includes a support base, a pair of fingers disposed on the base which extend forwardly a certain distance therefrom, and a two-degree of freedom elongate thumb. The thumb is pivotally attached at a proximal end to the base to extend generally forwardly therefrom, and terminates in a distal end tip which may be moved vertically and laterally with respect to the fingers to thereby enable holding objects between one or both fingers and the thumb. The fingers are moveable in a plane toward or away from each other, and include tip sections which are pivotable downwardly in a direction generally normal to the plane of movement of the fingers. A unique linkage apparatus intercouples the fingers with the base such that a non-pivotal, back-and-forth-moving piston rod can be used to move the fingers. The fingers contain gripping structure including rigid, pointed protuberances interleaved with flexible, blunt protuberances which are longer than the rigid protuberances. With the two-degree of freedom movement of the thumb and the movement of the fingers and their tip sections, a variety of different shaped objects may be grasped and held between the two fingers and thumb.

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A connection element such as a thimble connects to a user’s body member, through a linkage, to a ground reference. The apparatus physically exchanges a force with a user in an environment local to the user. The linkage powers at least three independent freedoms of the connection element relative to the reference. It also maintains at least one independent freedom of the connection element relative to the reference free of power. Up to three independent freedoms of the connection element may be maintained free of power, and up to five independent freedoms may be powered. A gimbal connects the gimbal to the linkage. Zero, one or two of the gimbal axes may be powered. A five bar linkage connects the connection element to a counter-balance that also includes two actuators. A third actuator connects the five bar linkage to the reference. The two actuators of the counterbalance may be connected to the next link in the chain to the reference through a single cable. Signal processing equipment powers the actuators to deliver a signal at the connection element that represents a virtual situation generated by a programmed computer, or physical conditions in a remote environment. A virtual switch presents to the user the force and displacement relationship of a spring switch. A virtual bristled brush presents the force and displacement relationship of such a brush, while also changing the virtual environment to reflect the user’s changes in location.

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A control apparatus and method for controlling a remote actuator, the control apparatus having a kinesthetic feedback system for providing a kinesthetic sensation to the operator as a physical sensation representative of the resistive forces encountered by the remote actuator. The control apparatus is configured to be releasably mounted to the hand of the operator with control modules supported at preselected joints of the hand. The control modules sense changes in the angular orientation in the respective joints and generate a control signal as a function of the change. This control signal is used to drive the corresponding actuator. Each actuator includes a sensor to sense resistive forces encountered by the actuator and generate a response signal as a function of the resistive forces. A magnetostrictive clutch mechanism on the control module is controlled by the response signal to provide a resistive force against movement of the control module thereby providing a kinesthetic sensation to the hand of the operator.

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A movement actuator includes an elongate filament made of a flexible material, and a strip of shape memory alloy disposed on the surface of one side of the filament. The shape memory alloy is responsive to actuation signals, heat or electrical signals, for changing its shape and when its shape changes, it causes the filament to move, i.e., bend, to accommodate the change in shape of the alloy. Also included is a signal supply device for selectively applying heat signals or electrical current to the strip of shape memory alloy to cause the alloy to change its shape and cause the filament to bend. Other patterns for the shape memory alloy could be disposed on the filament to cause other kinds of movements. For example, a helical pattern of the shape memory alloy about the filament would cause the filament to twist when the helical pattern were caused to shorten or lengthen.

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