Dynamic Walking Research Home Page

Fumihiko Asano, Dr. Eng.
Keywords: Passive dynamic walking, Biped robots, Legged locomotion, Virtual gravity, Gait generation, Mechanical energy, Efficiency


Abstract: McGeer's passive dynamic walking (PDW) has been considered as a clue to elucidate for realization of energy-efficient level walking. We investigated and clarified PDW mechanisms from mechanical energy point of view. The essence of dynamic walking is to restore the mechanical energy during the single support phase which is dissipated by the transition impact, and the main subject then yields the question of how to restore the mechanical energy efficiently. It has been clarified that, however, there exists a serious trade-off between the gait performances and the zero moment point (ZMP) condition. We must conclude that energy-efficient biped gait generation is still difficult. Now we are investigating several new approaches: 1) parametrically excited dynamic bipedal walking , 2) mechanisms of semicircular feet.


Publications

Doctoral Thesis

"Virtual Passivity Based Control of Dynamic Bipedal Walking", Tokyo Institute of Technology, March 2002.

Journal Papers
  1. M. Yamakita and F. Asano, "Extended Passive Velocity Field Control with Variable Velocity Fields for A Kneed Biped," Advanced Robotics, Vol. 15, No. 2, pp. 139-168, 2001.
  2. F. Asano and M. Yamakita, "Active Knee-lock Algorithms and Virtual Coupling Control for Variable Walking Pattern of A Kneed Biped," Journal of the Institute of Systems, Control and Information Engineers (ISCIE), Vol. 14, No. 11, pp. 545-553, 2001. (In Japanese)
  3. F. Asano and M. Yamakita, "Virtual Gravity and Coupling Control for Robotic Gait Synthesis," IEEE Trans. on Systems, Man and Cybernetics, Part A: Systems and Humans, Vol. 31, No. 6, pp. 737-745, November 2001.
  4. F. Asano, Z.-W. Luo and M. Yamakita, "Gait Generation and Control for Biped Robots Based on Passive Dynamic Walking," J. of Robotics Society of Japan, Vol. 22, No. 1, pp. 130-139, 2004. (In Japanese) [Download]
  5. F. Asano, M. Yamakita, N. Kamamichi and Z.-W. Luo, "A Novel Gait Generation for Biped Walking Robots Based on Mechanical Energy Constraint," IEEE Trans. on Robotics and Automation, Vol. 20, No. 3, pp. 565-573, 2004. [Download]
  6. F. Asano, Z.-W. Luo and M. Yamakita, "Biped Gait Generation and Control Based on A Unified Property of Passive Dynamic Walking", IEEE Trans. on Robotics, Vol. 21, No. 4, pp. 754-762, 2005. [Download]
  7. F. Asano, Z.-W. Luo and M. Yamakita, "Dynamic Gait Generation and Control based on Mechanical Energy Restoration", J. of Robotics Society of Japan, Vol. 23, No. 7, pp. 821-830, 2005. (In Japanese) [Download]
Conference Papers
  1. F. Asano, M. Yamakita and K. Furuta, "A Gait Design of Humanoid Robot using Passive Biped Walking," Proc. of the SICE Annual Conf., Vol. 2, pp. 413-414, 1999.
  2. F. Asano, M. Yamakita and K. Furuta, "Stabilizing Control of Passive Biped Robot and Its Application to Active Walking," Proc. of the Int. Symp. on Artificial Life and Robotics (AROB), Vol. 2, pp. 503-506, 2000.
  3. M. Yamakita, F. Asano and K. Furuta, "An Application of PVFC to Biped Walking Robots," Proc. of the JSME Conf. on Robotics and Mechatronics, CD-ROM, 2P2-84-128, 2000.
  4. M. Yamakita, F. Asano and K. Furuta, "Passive Velocity Field Control of Biped Walking Robot," Proc. of the IEEE Int. Conf. on Robotics and Automation (ICRA), Vol. 3, pp. 3057-3062, 2000.
  5. F. Asano and M. Yamakita, "Extended PVFC with Variable Velocity Field for Kneed Biped," Proc. of the SICE Annual Conf., CD-ROM, PR0001, 106D-2, 2000.
  6. M. Hashimoto, F. Asano and M. Yamakita, "Passive Velocity Field Control for Biped Walking Robot: Experimental Study," Proc. of the SICE Annual Conf., CD-ROM, PR0001, 106D-4, 2000.
  7. F. Asano and M. Yamakita, "Extended PVFC with Variable Velocity Fields for Kneed Biped," Proc. of the IEEE-RAS Int. Conf. on Humanoid Robots (Humanoids), CD-ROM, 2000.
  8. F. Asano, M. Yamakita and K. Furuta, "Virtual Passive Dynamic Walking and Energy-based Control Laws," Proc. of the IEEE/RSJ Int. Conf. on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS), Vol. 2, pp. 1149-1154, 2000.
  9. F. Asano, M. Hashimoto, N. Kamamichi and M. Yamakita, "Extended Virtual Passive Dynamic Walking and Virtual Passivity-mimicking Control Laws," Proc. of the IEEE Int. Conf. on Robotics and Automation (ICRA), Vol. 3, pp. 3139-3144, 2001.
  10. F. Asano and M. Yamakita, "Active Knee-lock Algorithms and Virtual Coupling Control for Variable Walking Pattern of A Kneed Biped," Proc. of the RSJ/JSME/SICE Robotics Symposia, pp. 87-92, 2001.
  11. N. Kamamichi, F. Asano and M. Yamakita, "Virtual Coupling Control for Generation of Limit Cycle and Its Application to Biped Robot," Proc. of the SICE Annual Conf., CD-ROM, PR0001, 107A-3, 2001.
  12. F. Asano and M. Yamakita, "Dynamic Gait Synthesis and Control Based on Mechanical Energy Constraint ," Proc. of the Annual Conf. of the Robotic Society of Japan, pp. 45-46, 2001.
  13. F. Asano and M. Yamakita, "Virtual Gravity and Coupling Control for Robotic Gait Synthesis," Proc. of the IMEKO/SICE/IEEE Int. Symp. on Measurement, Analysis and Modeling of Human Functions (ISHF), pp. 509-514, 2001.
  14. M. Yamakita, N. Kamamichi and F. Asano, "Virtual Coupling Control for Dynamic Bipedal Walking," Proc. of the IEEE/RSJ Int. Conf. on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS), pp. 233-238, 2001.
  15. F. Asano and M. Yamakita, "Virtual Passivity Based Control for Variable Dynamic Bipedal Walking," Proc. of the JSME Conf. on Robotics and Mechatronics, CD-ROM, 2A1-D03, 2002.
  16. F. Asano, M. Yamakita, N. Kamamichi and Z.-W. Luo, "A Novel Gait Generation for Biped Walking Robots Based on Mechanical Energy Constraint," Proc. of the IEEE/RSJ Int. Conf. on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS), pp. 2637-2644, 2002.
  17. F. Asano, M. Yamakita and Z.-W. Luo, "Stable Gait Generation and Control Based on Lumped Virtual Gravity," Proc. of the Annual Conf. of the Robotic Society of Japan, pp. 45-46, 2002.
  18. F. Asano, M. Yamakita and Z.-W. Luo, "Model Following Type PVFC for Variable Dynamic Bipedal Walking," Proc. of the ICASE/SICE Joint Workshop, pp. 310-314, 2002.
  19. Z.-W. Luo, T. Odashima, F. Asano and S. Hosoe, "On Recent Bio-mimetic Studies of Legged Locomotion -- Diversity, Adaptability and Energy Consumption for Hexapod, Quadruped and Biped," Proc. of the 2nd Int. Symp. on Adaptive Motion of Animals and Machines (AMAM), CD-ROM, WeP-III-2, 2003.
  20. F. Asano, Z.-W. Luo and M. Yamakita, "A Unified Formulation and Solutions to Gait Generation Problems Based on Passive Dynamic Walking", Proc. of the 6th Int. Conf. on Climing and Walking Robots (CLAWAR), pp. 451-458, 2003. [Download]
  21. F. Asano, Z.-W. Luo and M. Yamakita, "A Unified Formulation of Gait Generation Based on Passive Dynamic Walking - Part I: Mechanical Principal and Control Synthesis", Proc. of the 21st Annual Conf. of the Robotics Society of Japan, 3I11, 2003.
  22. F. Asano, Z.-W. Luo and M. Yamakita, "A Unified Formulation of Gait Generation Based on Passive Dynamic Walking - Part II: An Extension to A Kneed Biped Model", Proc. of the 21st Annual Conf. of the Robotics Society of Japan, 3I12, 2003.
  23. F. Asano, Z.-W. Luo and M. Yamakita, "Some Extensions of Passive Walking Formula to Active Biped Robots", Proc. of the IEEE Int. Conf. on Robotics and Automation (ICRA), pp. 3797-3802, 2004. [Download]
  24. F. Asano, Z.-W. Luo and M. Yamakita, "Unification of Gait Generation Methods via Variable Virtual Gravity and Its Control Performance Analysis", Proc. of the JSME Conf. on Robotics and Mechatronics, CD-ROM, 1A1-L1-52(1)-(4), 2004.
  25. F. Asano, Z.-W. Luo and M. Yamakita, "Unification of Dynamic Gait Generation Methods via Variable Virtual Gravity and Its Control Performance Analysis", Proc. of the IEEE/RSJ Int. Conf. on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS), pp. 3865-3870, 2004. [Download]

Program of passive dynamic walking for MaTX
  1. Passive dynamic walking (Compass-type) [Download]
  2. Virtual passive dynamic walking (Compass-type, single VG) [Download]
  3. Virtual passive dynamic walking (Knee-type, single VG) [Download]
  4. Dynamic walking by LVG [Download]
  5. Dynamic walking by decoupled control [Download]
  6. Active dynamic walking by solution of the new indeterminate equation, Ver.1.0 [Download]
  7. Virtual passive dynamic walking, Ver.2.0 [Download]
  8. Active dynamic walking by energy constraint control, Ver.1.1 [Download]
  9. Robust active dynamic walking by solution of single new indeterminate equation, Ver.1.0 [Download]
  10. Robust active dynamic walking by solution of multi new indeterminate equations, Ver.1.0 [Download]
  11. Active dynamic walking with knees based on new indeterminate equation, Ver.1.0 [Download]

Movie Collection
  1. Experimental passive dynamic walking
  2. Experimental virtual passive dynamic walking by BVCC
  3. Experimental virtual passive dynamic walking by ECC
  4. Asymptotically stable walking (Simulation)
  5. Energy constraint control (Simulation and experiment)
  6. Dynamic walking by LVG
  7. Dynamic walking by decoupled control
  8. Variable dynamic walking by PVFC without reset of flywheel
  9. Variable dynamic walking by PVFC
  10. Variable dynamic walking by extended PVFC

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