Adaptive neural-network-based control of robotic manipulators

Robotic manipulators are beginning to be seen doing more tasks in our environment. Classical controls engineers have long known how to control these automated hands. They have failed to address the continued control of these devices after parts of the control infrastructure have failed. A failed motor or actuator in a manipulator decreases its range of motion and changes its control structure. Most failures however do not render the manipulator useless. This paper will discuss the use of a neural network to actively update the controller design as portions of a manipulator fail. Actuators can become stuck and later free themselves. Motors can lose range of motion or stop completely. Connecting arms can become bent or entangled. Results will be presented on the ability to maintain functionality through a variety of failure modes. The neural network is constructed and tested in a Matlab environment. This allows testing of several neural network techniques such as back propagation and temporal processing without the need to continually reconfigure target hardware. In this paper we will demonstrate that a modified ensemble of back propagation experts can be trained to control a robotic manipulator without the need to calculate the inverse kinematics equations. Further individual experts can be retrained online to allow for adaptive control through changing dynamics. This allows for manipulators to remain in service through failures in the manipulator infrastructure without the need for human intervention into control equations.