A deterministic sampling-based approach to global footstep planning for humanoid robots

Global humanoid footstep planning in complex domestic environments is different from mobile robot path planning because humanoid robots do not always circumvent obstacles considering their unique capabilities of stepping over or upon certain obstacles. This paper presents a deterministic sampling-based approach to global footstep planning for humanoid robots, which not only considers this unique locomotion capability, but also the legged kinodynamics and stability constraint. A dynamic footstep transition model is employed in the proposed footstep planner which improves the planning efficiency as well as the feasibility in certain environments. A frame of posture transition trajectory planning, which includes “offline generation - online calling” and “offline generation - online modification” modes, is also described. Simulation results verify the feasibilities and improved performance of the proposed footstep planning approach and its affiliated trajectory planning methods.

[1]  Takeo Kanade,et al.  Footstep Planning for the Honda ASIMO Humanoid , 2005, Proceedings of the 2005 IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation.

[2]  Jean-Claude Latombe,et al.  Robot motion planning , 1970, The Kluwer international series in engineering and computer science.

[3]  Joel E. Chestnutt,et al.  A tiered planning strategy for biped navigation , 2004, 4th IEEE/RAS International Conference on Humanoid Robots, 2004..

[4]  Yasar Ayaz,et al.  Human-like Approach to Footstep Planning among Obstacles for Humanoid Robots , 2007, Int. J. Humanoid Robotics.

[5]  Masayuki Inaba,et al.  Footstep planning among obstacles for biped robots , 2001, Proceedings 2001 IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems. Expanding the Societal Role of Robotics in the the Next Millennium (Cat. No.01CH37180).

[6]  Takeo Kanade,et al.  Vision-guided humanoid footstep planning for dynamic environments , 2005, 5th IEEE-RAS International Conference on Humanoid Robots, 2005..

[7]  Rodney A. Brooks,et al.  Humanoid robots , 2002, CACM.

[8]  J. Chestnutt,et al.  Planning Biped Navigation Strategies in Complex Environments , 2003 .

[9]  Yasar Ayaz,et al.  Human-Like Approach to Footstep Planning Among Obstacles for Humanoid Robots , 2006, 2006 IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems.

[10]  Joel Chestnutt,et al.  Navigation planning for legged robots , 2007 .

[11]  D. Wollherr,et al.  A Jacobian Method for Online Modification of Precalculated Gait Trajectories , 2003 .

[12]  Masayuki Inaba,et al.  Online footstep planning for humanoid robots , 2003, 2003 IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (Cat. No.03CH37422).

[13]  Masayuki Inaba,et al.  Motion Planning for Humanoid Robots , 2003, ISRR.