Arm-manipulator coordination for load sharing using variable compliance control

Coordination of a human arm and a manipulator to share a load is a new problem. In this paper, we propose a variable compliance control as a coordination mechanism for the arm and the manipulator. The compliance will be updated according to the force exerted by the manipulator. This coordination mechanism is proposed to accommodate with the uncertainties associated with the impedance of the human arm and the weight of the object. Furthermore, the stability of the system and the manipulation speed will be improved. The stability problem is studied using the small gain theorem. Experiments were conducted in our laboratory to prove the effectiveness of the proposed scheme