ORCID
- Pablo Borja: 0000-0001-7744-0846
Abstract
The existing model-based control strategies for tendon-driven continuum soft robots neglect the dynamics of the actuation system. Nevertheless, such dynamics have an important impact on the closed-loop performance. This work analyzes the influence of the actuation dynamics in tendon-driven continuum soft robots performing trajectory-tracking tasks. To this end, we use singular perturbation (SP) theory to design controllers that account for such dynamics. We provide the analytical formulation of the SP controllers and their in-depth experimental validation. Additionally, we use high-and low-stiffness tendons to experimentally compare the performance of the proposed SP controllers against traditional feedback control schemes that disregard the actuation dynamics. The experimental results show that SP controllers outperform the approaches that neglect the actuation dynamics by reducing oscillations and achieving lower errors without relying on high gains. Furthermore, it is shown that neglecting the actuation dynamics may lead to instability when the tendons have a low stiffness coefficient.
Publication Date
2025-03-11
Publication Title
IEEE Transactions on Control Systems Technology
Volume
PP
Issue
99
ISSN
2374-0159
Keywords
Soft robotics, Robots, Tendons, Vectors, Aerodynamics, Motors, Actuators, Trajectory, Frequency modulation, Jacobian matrices, singular perturbation, Continuum soft robots, model-based control, tendon-driven robots
First Page
1
Last Page
8
Recommended Citation
Novaki Ribeiro, L., Borja, P., Della Santina, C., & Deutschmann, B. (2025) 'Singular-Perturbation Control of a Tendon-Driven Soft Robot: Theory and Experiments', IEEE Transactions on Control Systems Technology, PP(99), pp. 1-8. Available at: 10.1109/TCST.2025.3546564
