Editor:Ana Hu
China exportsemi net
Humanoid robots are expected to become disruptive products after computers, smartphones, and new energy vehicles. They have great development potential and broad application prospects, and will be a new track for future products. Today, China Overseas Semiconductor will continue to take you to learn about Boston Dynamics’ humanoid robot Atlas.
The development of the humanoid robot industry has always attracted much attention, and in recent years more and more companies have become involved in it. This is not unrelated to my country's policy support. Last month, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology issued the "Guiding Opinions on the Innovation and Development of Humanoid Robots", which mentioned that humanoid robots are expected to become disruptive products after computers, smartphones, and new energy vehicles, with great development potential and broad application prospects. It will be a new track for future products. Sinolink Securities recently released the "Robot Industry Research", and China Overseas Semiconductor continues to interpret this industry report with everyone.
In this series of articles, you will learn about: the current status, application scenarios, technical barriers, and future development directions of humanoid robots at home and abroad. Today, let’s take a look at Boston Dynamics’ humanoid robot.
Boston Dynamics: Using hydraulic servo drive, Atlas has outstanding maneuverability
Founded in 1992, Boston Dynamics is a division of a well-known American robotics company. It has been deeply involved in the field of robotics for more than 30 years and has the world's leading robotics technology.
- In the field of quadruped robots ,
——In 1986, while founder Raibert was still working at MIT, he developed the first quadruped robot that could walk and run and was fully dynamically stable.
——In 2005, Boston Dynamics cooperated with the U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency to launch the four-legged robot Big Dog. Since then, Boston Dynamics has continued to conduct robot research and launched a variety of robot products such as LS3, Wild Cat, and Spot.
- In the field of humanoid robots,
——In 2009, Boston Dynamics launched the bipedal robot Petman, which is mainly used to test the performance of US military protective clothing and military equipment.
——In 2013, Boston Dynamics continued to improve on Petman and released the humanoid robot Atlas. ——Since 2013, Boston Dynamics has continuously improved the performance of Atlas, and now has the ability to climb over obstacles, turn in the air, back flip, and navigate autonomously in narrow terrain.
Figure 1: Appearance of Atlas humanoid robot
Humanoid robot Atlas is flexible and flexible
The humanoid robot Atlas is flexible and can complete many difficult actions. The Atlas humanoid robot is 1.5 meters tall, weighs about 80 kilograms, has 28 degrees of freedom (hydraulic joints), and is equipped with an RGB camera and depth sensor. Atlas has a knee joint torque of up to 890N·m, a hip joint torque of 840N·m, and a walking speed of 1.5m/s. According to the Atlas parkour video released by Boston Dynamics in 2021, Atlas can successfully complete actions such as jumping on the balance beam, crossing the slope, and performing continuous backflips.
Figure 2: Atlas humanoid robot can complete difficult actions such as jumping on balance beams, climbing slopes, and backflips
In January 2023, Boston Dynamics released the latest video of the Atlas humanoid robot. In the video, Atlas acts as an assistant to humans at the construction site. It performs quite well, completing tasks such as: building bridges, climbing stairs, flying around, throwing tool bags at humans, front flips, etc. Sensitive action.
Figure 3: Atlas humanoid robot serves as an assistant to humans in the factory
Reasons for the excellent performance of humanoid robot Atlas
Hardware: Hydraulic drive + 3D printed parts, the humanoid robot Atlas is highly maneuverable.
Advantages of hydraulic servo drive technology: The principle of hydraulic drive is to generate high-pressure liquid through a liquid compression pump. The high pressure acts on the cylinder to generate huge thrust, driving the robot joints to move. Simply from the analysis of the backflip action, the impact force of the ground on Atlas when landing is relatively large. Atlas adopts an electric + hydraulic hybrid drive mode. Compared with a simple motor drive, the hydraulic drive has a high-load drive characteristic, which brings Atlas greater impact resistance. In addition, the hydraulic structure makes the robot more "elastic". In addition to the compressibility of the oil itself, the use of accumulators can also play a shock-absorbing role, making the limbs more elastic.
Boston Dynamics is a technological leader in the field of hydraulic drive. According to Boston Dynamics’ official website, Atlas has one of the most compact mobile hydraulic systems in the world. Custom electric motors, valves and compact hydraulic power units enable Atlas to deliver high power to any of its 28 hydraulic connections. Atlas has a very compact hydraulic drive unit that weighs 5kg and has a power of 5kW. It contains an electric pump reservoir, batteries, filters, electronics and a cooling system. With 28 hydraulic drives, it can complete a variety of explosive acrobatic moves. .
Figure 4: Atlas hydraulic drive device and principle display
3D printing saves space: The simplest hydraulic actuator requires a fuel tank, a hydraulic pump, a servo hydraulic valve, a relief valve, a hydraulic pipeline, an actuator (cylinder), and various hydraulic pressures such as torque, angular displacement, and angular velocity for feedback control. sensor. In order to save space, Atlas used 3D printing technology to make the robot's legs, fully embedding servo valves, actuators, and hydraulic pipelines into the limb mechanism components, achieving a perfect integration of the hydraulic system and limbs while also saving costs. In addition, Atlas is 1.5m tall and weighs 80kg, and 3D printed parts give it the strength-to-weight ratio required for jumping and somersaulting.
Figure 5: Atlas uses 3D printing to build hydraulic pipes and valves
Software: autonomous pace planning algorithm + behavior library + model predictive control, powerful perception and execution functions
Autonomous pace planning algorithm: Atlas uses an integrated IMU, joint position and force sensors to control its own body movements, and maintains balance and identifies gaps in obstacles by sensing the ground. Atlas uses a TOF depth camera to generate point clouds (large-scale collections of ranging) of the environment at 15 frames per second. Atlas' perception software uses a multi-plane segmentation algorithm to extract planes from the point cloud and ultimately build models for various obstacles.
Figure 6: Rotated view of the point cloud of the Atlas robot captured by the depth camera, which enables it to plan behavior through visual perception
Behavior Library: Every move Atlas makes in parkour originates from templates created in advance using trajectory optimization. New functionality can be continuously added to Atlas by adding new tracks to the template library. Given a perception plan goal, Atlas can select behaviors from the library that match the given goal. Engineers can optimize Atlas' motion trajectory through offline design. For example, when crossing a balance beam, the robot behavior is a complex behavior designed using offline trajectory optimization, while an online controller brings the template actions to life.
Model Predictive Control: After identifying boxes, ramps, or obstacles in front of the robot and planning a series of maneuvers to get over them, Atlas needs the details needed to reliably execute the plan. The Atlas controller is called a model predictive controller (MPC), which uses a model of the robot dynamics to predict the robot's future movements. The working principle is to use optimization to calculate the best thing to do at the moment in Atlas, thereby producing the best actions over time, and the templates in the behavior library will provide the best solution to the controller.
Figure 7: Offline trajectory optimization helps Atlas complete behaviors such as turning the balance beam
For now, Atlas is still positioned as a research platform and has not yet been commercialized. Although the hydraulic drive solution has strong explosive power, its shortcomings include high noise, easy leakage, sensitivity to pollution, high precision and quality requirements for hydraulic components, and high requirements for maintenance teams. This results in high manufacturing costs and makes it difficult to move out of the laboratory and into commercialization. . According to Dayu Robot’s WeChat public account, the price of Atals humanoid robots is too high, with a single unit worth about US$2 million, and there are currently no commercialization attempts. In addition, Atals’ capabilities such as backflips are less useful in actual business environments, and Boston Dynamics still positions Atlas as a research platform.
In the next issue, we will take a look at the humanoid robot from 1X Technologies . Stay tuned. If you have any thoughts about our content in this issue, please feel free to communicate (anahu@ehaitech.com)
Data sources: Boston Dynamics official website, Heart of the Machine, Hydraulic Transmission and Control, Smart Things
Reference source: China National Securities Research Institute
"Humanoid Robot Industry Research Report" series of articles:
