Robust stability analysis of bilateral teleoperation systems using admittance-type devices

One of the main challenges in telerobotics is the selection of control architectures and control parameters, which are able to robustly stabilize the overall teleoperation system despite of changing human operator and environment impedances. In this paper robust stability of different types of bilateral control algorithms for admittance type devices is analyzed. Hereby, stability of the system is investigated by using the parameter space approach, which allows the analysis of uncertain systems with varying plant parameters. Simple linear models are assumed for human operator, human-system interface, teleoperator as well as remote environment. The parameter space method is used for controller design, as well as for robustness analysis. Finally, Gamma-stability of the presented architectures is evaluated for a one degree-of-freedom mechatronic teleoperation system.