VIsion force control in task-oriented grasping and manipulation

In this paper, we present a novel approach for sensor-guided robotic execution of everyday tasks, which is amenable to be integrated in current mobile manipulators and humanoid robots. We consider a robot which is observing simultaneously his hand and the object to manipulate, by using an external camera (i.e. robot head). Task-oriented grasping algorithms are used in order to plan a suitable grasp on the object according to the task to perform. A new vision/force coupling approach [1] is used in order to, first, guide the robot hand towards the grasp position and, second, perform the task taking into account external forces. Experimental results on a real robot are presented which validate our approach.