ME 449 Robotic Manipulation
Spring Quarter 2014
- Instructor: Prof. Kevin Lynch
- Office hours: Mon 3-4 PM, Wed 4-5 PM, Tech B222, Adam: Fri 2-3 PM (No office hours 5/2 or 5/5-5/9, Office Hours 5/1 from 11am-12am), Tech B230
- Meeting: 11-11:50 MWF, Tech LG68
- course website: http://hades.mech.northwestern.edu/index.php/ME_449_Robotic_Manipulation
Course Summary
Mechanics of robotic manipulation, computer representations and algorithms for manipulation planning, and applications to industrial automation, parts feeding, grasping, fixturing, and assembly.
Grading
Grading for the course will be based on student lectures, problem sets and a final project. There will be no exams. The final project, due during finals week, will take the form of a conference paper analyzing a manipulation problem, building on another research paper, or implementing a simulation.
Course Text
"Introduction to Robotics: Mechanics, Planning, and Control," F. C. Park and K. M. Lynch. These course notes will be undergoing revision throughout the quarter; check the timestamp in the table of contents.
Summary of important equations.
Assignments
- Assignment 1, due Monday 4/14 at the beginning of class Solutions
- Assignment 2, due Monday 4/28 at the beginning of class Solutions
- Assignment 3, due Monday 5/12 at the beginning of class Solutions
- Assignment 4, due Wednesday 5/21 at the beginning of class Solutions File:ME449 2014 Solns Last Problem.zip
- Assignment 5, due Wednesday 5/30 at the beginning of class
- Assignment 6, due Friday 6/11 at 11 AM. This assignment refers to the IROS 2005 paper by Srinivasa et al.
Approximate Syllabus
Student videos are due at least 48 hours before the first class they will be used for.
Configuration Space
reading: Chapter 2
- degrees of freedom, Grubler's formula, parameterizations, holonomic and nonholonomic constraints (classes 1-2)
Rigid-Body Motions (classes 3-6), through Fri April 11
reading: Chapter 3, but you may skim/skip 3.2.2, 3.2.4
- rotation matrices, Euler angles, exponential coordinates, unit quaternions
- angular velocities
- rigid-body motions
- spatial velocities
Forward Kinematics, through Wed April 16
reading: Chapter 4, but you may skim/skip 4.1 and 4.2.3
- product of exponentials formula (class 7; Patrick Afrifah and Matthew Patrick)
Velocity Kinematics and Statics, through Wed April 23
reading: Chapter 5
- coordinate, space, and body Jacobians (classes 8-9)
- statics of open chains, singularities, manipulability (classes 10-11; Kevin Siegler and Andrew Welter)
Inverse Kinematics, through Mon April 28
reading: Chapter 6, but you may skip 6.1
- 2R example, numerical methods, and redundant open chains (classes 12-13)
Dynamics of Open Chains, through Wed May 7
reading: Chapter 8.1 and 8.2 on Lagrangian formulation, rest of the chapter on Newton-Euler and task space coords
- Lagrangian formulation, dynamics of a single rigid body (classes 14-15; Harry Briggs and Stefan Hyde)
- Newton-Euler inverse and forward dynamics of open chains, dynamics in task space (classes 16-17; Ahalya Prabhakar and Ben Richardson)
Trajectory Generation, through Mon May 12
reading: Chapter 9, but you may skip 9.2 and 9.3
- definitions and time-optimal time scaling (classes 18-19; Wentao Chen and Chi Zhang)
Motion Planning, through Wed May 21
reading: Chapter 10 through 10.5.1
- overview, foundations, and complete path planners (classes 20-21; Siddarth Jain)
- grid methods and the RRT sampling method (classes 22-23)
Robot Control
optional: Chapter 11
Grasping and Manipulation, through Fri June 6
reading: Chapter 12
- contact kinematics, planar graphical methods, and form closure (classes 24-25)
- contact forces, planar graphical methods, and force closure, Chapter 12.2 (classes 26-27; Xiang Chen and Xiaobin Xiong)
- other manipulation, Chapter 12.3 (classes 28-29; Max Shepherd and Zack Woodruff)
