Impedance Control for Soft Robots

Soft robots equipped with variable stiffness actuators (VSA) are robust against impacts and are energetically efficient. However, due to the real springs in the joints, soft robots can oscillate even when the motors do not move. This makes the control of, for instance, the end-effector a challenging task. A new method is presented enabling to control the interaction behaviour of soft robots, which is called Elastic Structure Preserving Impedance (ESPi) control. The performance of ESPi control is demonstrate