Anthropomimetic Soft Robotic Forearm with Independently Articulated Carpal Bones Enabling Human-Like Adaptive Stiffness Modulability
作者: Yoshinobu Obata, Yinlai Jiang, Hiroshi Yokoi, Shunta Togo
分类: cs.RO
发布日期: 2026-09-24
备注: 30 pages, 17 figures, 5 tables. Supplementary material included. Data, CAD and code: https://github.com/TogoLab/anthropomimetic-forearm-carpal-stiffness
💡 一句话要点
提出类人软体机器人前臂以实现人类腕关节的适应性刚度调节
🎯 匹配领域: 支柱一：机器人控制 (Robot Control)
关键词: 类人机器人 软体机器人 腕关节 刚度调节 肌肉激活 解剖学复制 运动分析
📋 核心要点
- 现有的机器人腕关节在适应性刚度调节方面存在不足，无法有效模拟人类腕关节的灵活性和稳定性。
- 本文提出了一种解剖学准确的类人软体机器人前臂，通过独立可动的腕骨和驱动肌肉实现腕关节的刚度调节。
- 实验结果显示，腕骨的形态对刚度调节有显著影响，精确的解剖复制能够再现人类的刚度调节能力。
📝 摘要（中文）
人类腕关节具有适应性刚度调节能力，通过肌肉共同收缩可以主动调节关节刚度的各向异性。为了解这一功能的形态学因素，本文开发了一种解剖学准确的类人软体机器人前臂，包含八个独立可动的腕骨、22个驱动肌肉和柔性指尖。通过在三种骨骼配置下测量腕关节刚度，结果表明，精确的解剖复制能够再现人类的刚度调节能力。这些发现表明腕骨形态在腕关节刚度调节中起主导作用，并为类人机器人腕关节的设计提供了原则。
🔬 方法详解
问题定义：本文旨在解决现有机器人腕关节在适应性刚度调节方面的不足，现有方法无法有效模拟人类腕关节的灵活性和稳定性。
核心思路：论文的核心思路是开发一种解剖学准确的类人软体机器人前臂，通过独立可动的腕骨和驱动肌肉来实现腕关节的刚度调节，以更好地模拟人类的功能。
技术框架：整体架构包括八个独立可动的腕骨、22个驱动肌肉和柔性指尖，采用不同的肌肉激活模式在三种骨骼配置下进行刚度测量。
关键创新：最重要的技术创新点在于通过精确的解剖复制实现了人类腕关节的刚度调节能力，这与现有方法的本质区别在于对腕骨形态的重视。
关键设计：关键参数设置包括三种骨骼配置（解剖正常、融合近端腕骨、几何椭球骨架），并通过不同的肌肉激活模式进行实验，分析腕骨运动的耦合模式。
🖼️ 关键图片
📊 实验亮点
实验结果表明，在激活手指肌肉时，腕关节在投掷运动方向上的刚度较低，而同时激活腕部和手指肌肉时刚度显著提高。这些结果与人类测量结果一致，验证了模型的有效性。
🎯 应用场景
该研究的潜在应用领域包括类人机器人、康复机器人和人机交互系统。通过模拟人类腕关节的适应性刚度调节，能够提升机器人在复杂环境中的操作能力和灵活性，具有重要的实际价值和未来影响。
📄 摘要（原文）
The human wrist exhibits adaptive stiffness modulability: joint stiffness anisotropy can be actively regulated through muscle co-contraction. This functionality is essential for stable manipulation, yet the underlying morphological factors remain unclear. To identify these factors, we developed an anatomically accurate anthropomimetic soft robotic forearm comprising eight independently movable carpal bones interconnected by ligaments, 22 actuated muscles, and compliant fingertips. We measured wrist joint stiffness under four muscle activation patterns across three skeletal configurations: anatomically normal carpal bones, a fused proximal carpal row, and a geometric ellipsoidal skeleton. The stiffness ellipse exhibited low stiffness along the dart-throwing motion (DTM) direction when finger muscles were activated, but high stiffness along the same direction when wrist and finger muscles were activated simultaneously. These results agree with previously reported human measurements, demonstrating that precise anatomical replication reproduces human-like stiffness modulability. Fusing the proximal carpal row eliminated the low DTM-direction stiffness under finger muscle activation, while the geometric ellipsoidal skeleton showed poor stiffness ellipse reorientation across all conditions. Carpal bone motion analysis revealed significantly opposing coupling patterns between wrist and finger muscles at the proximal carpal row, accompanied by a consistent but non-significant trend at the midcarpal joint, providing a mechanical explanation for this modulation. These findings demonstrate that carpal bone morphology plays a dominant role in human wrist stiffness modulation and provide design principles for humanoid robot wrists.