2020/02/20 by Jared Nakahara, Nakahara, Jared, Boling Yang +3
Computer Science · Engineering · #Acoustic levitation #Acoustics #Artificial intelligence #Computer science #Computer vision #Electrowetting and Microfluidic Technologies #Engineering #FOS: Computer and information sciences #FOS: Electrical engineering #GRASP #Levitation #Mechanical engineering #Microfluidic and Bio-sensing Technologies #Millimeter #Modular Robots and Swarm Intelligence #Object (grammar) #Optics #Physics #Robot #Robotics (cs.RO) #Systems and Control (eess.SY) #Ultrasonic sensor #cs.RO #cs.SY #eess.SY #electronic engineering #information engineering
paper · pdf · doi:10.48550/arxiv.2002.09056
8 pages, 8 figures, submitted to the 8th IEEE RAS/EMBS International Conference on Biomedical Robotics and Biomechatronics
arxiv created 2020/02/20 · openalex publication_date 2020/02/20 · arxiv updated 2020/02/24 · openalex created_date 2020/03/06 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/28
Although general purpose robotic manipulators are becoming more capable at manipulating various objects, their ability to manipulate millimeter-scale objects are usually very limited. On the other hand, ultrasonic levitation devices have been shown to levitate a large range of small objects, from polystyrene balls to living organisms. By controlling the acoustic force fields, ultrasonic levitation devices can compensate for robot manipulator positioning uncertainty and control the grasping force exerted on the target object. The material agnostic nature of acoustic levitation devices and their ability to dexterously manipulate millimeter-scale objects make them appealing as a grasping mode for general purpose robots. In this work, we present an ultrasonic, contact-less manipulation device that can be attached to or picked up by any general purpose robotic arm, enabling millimeter-scale manipulation with little to no modification to the robot itself. This device is capable of performing the very first phase-controlled picking action on acoustically reflective surfaces. With the manipulator placed around the target object, the manipulator can grasp objects smaller in size than the robot's positioning uncertainty, trap the object to resist air currents during robot movement, and dexterously hold a small and fragile object, like a flower bud. Due to the contact-less nature of the ultrasound-based gripper, a camera positioned to look into the cylinder can inspect the object without occlusion, facilitating accurate visual feature extraction.