Anne E. Martin

Design and experimental implementation of a hybrid zero dynamics-based controller for planar bipeds with curved feet

This paper extends the use of virtual constraints and hybrid zero dynamics (HZD), a successful control strategy for point-foot bipeds, to the design of controllers for planar curved foot bipeds. Although the rolling contact constraint at the foot–ground interface increases complexity somewhat, the measure of local stability remains a function of configuration only, and a closed-form solution still determines the existence of a periodic orbit. The formulation is validated in experiment using the planar five-link biped ERNIE. While gaits designed for point feet yielded stable walking when ERNIE was equipped with curved feet, errors in both desired speed and joint tracking were significantly larger than for gaits designed for the correct radius curved feet. Thus, HZD-based control of this biped is shown to be robust to some modeling error in the foot radius, but at the same time, to require consideration of foot radius to achieve predictably reliable walking gaits. Additionally, under HZD-based control, this biped walked with lower specific energetic cost of transport and joint tracking errors for matched curved foot gait design and hardware compared to matched point-foot gait design and hardware.

Predicting human walking gaits with a simple planar model

Models of human walking with moderate complexity have the potential to accurately capture both joint kinematics and whole body energetics, thereby offering more simultaneous information than very simple models and less computational cost than very complex models. This work examines four- and six-link planar biped models with knees and rigid circular feet. The two differ in that the six-link model includes ankle joints. Stable periodic walking gaits are generated for both models using a hybrid zero dynamics-based control approach. To establish a baseline of how well the models can approximate normal human walking, gaits were optimized to match experimental human walking data, ranging in speed from very slow to very fast. The six-link model well matched the experimental step length, speed, and mean absolute power, while the four-link model did not, indicating that ankle work is a critical element in human walking models of this type. Beyond simply matching human data, the six-link model can be used in an optimization framework to predict normal human walking using a torque-squared objective function. The model well predicted experimental step length, joint motions, and mean absolute power over the full range of speeds.

The effects of foot geometric properties on the gait of planar bipeds walking under HZD-based control

It has been hypothesized by many that foot design can influence gait. This idea was investigated in both simulation and hardware for the five-link, planar biped ERNIE controlled under the Hybrid Zero Dynamics paradigm. The effects of walking speed, foot radius, and foot center of curvature location on gait efficiency and kinematics were investigated in a full factorial study of gaits optimized using a work-based objective function. In most cases, the simulation correctly predicted the trends observed in hardware, indicating that simulation can be used for foot design. As expected, increasing walking speed decreased the energetic efficiency. The dominant effect of speed on joint kinematics was to alter the timing of the peak hip flexion. Increasing foot radius up to the length of the shank improved the energetic efficiency and increased the range of motion of the hip and knee joints. Shifting the foot center of curvature location forward altered the energetic efficiency in a manner that interacted with changes in foot radius. The energetically optimal foot center of curvature location was coincident with the shank for a large foot radius and shifted far in front of the shank for a small foot radius. In all cases, the forward shift increased the range of motion of the hip and knee joints. Therefore, a robot designer can achieve similar energetic benefits across a range of speeds with either a larger radius foot or a smaller radius foot whose center of curvature is located forward of the shank.

Stable, Robust Hybrid Zero Dynamics Control of Powered Lower-Limb Prostheses

To improve the quality of life for lower-limb amputees, powered prostheses are being developed. Advanced control schemes from the field of bipedal robots, such as hybrid zero dynamics (HZD), may provide great performance. HZD-based control specifies the motion of the actuated joints using output functions to be zeroed, and the required torques are calculated using input-output linearization. For one-step periodic gaits, there is an analytic metric of stability. To apply HZD-based control on a powered prosthesis, several modifications must be made. Because the prosthesis and amputee are only connected via the socket, the prosthesis controller does not have access to the full state of the biped, which decentralizes the form of the input-output linearization. The differences between the amputated and contralateral sides result in a two-step periodic gait, which requires the orbital stability metric to be extended. In addition, because human gait is variable, the prosthesis controller must be robust to continuous moderate perturbations. This robustness is proved using local input-to-state stability and demonstrated with simulations of an above-knee amputee model.

Unifying the gait cycle in the control of a powered prosthetic leg

This paper presents a novel control strategy for an above-knee powered prosthetic leg that unifies the entire gait cycle, eliminating the need to switch between controllers during different periods of gait. Current control methods divide the gait cycle into several sequential periods each with independent controllers, resulting in many patient-specific control parameters and switching rules that must be tuned by clinicians. Having a single controller could reduce the number of control parameters to be tuned for each patient, thereby reducing the clinical time and effort involved in fitting a powered prosthesis for a lower-limb amputee. Using the Discrete Fourier Transformation, a single virtual constraint is derived that exactly characterizes the desired actuated joint motion over the entire gait cycle. Because the virtual constraint is defined as a periodic function of a monotonically increasing phase variable, no switching or resetting is necessary within or across gait cycles. The output function is zeroed using feedback linearization to produce a single, unified controller. The method is illustrated with simulations of a powered knee-ankle prosthesis in an amputee biped model and with examples of systematically generated output functions for different walking speeds.

Toward Unified Control of a Powered Prosthetic Leg: A Simulation Study

This brief presents a novel control strategy for a powered knee-ankle prosthesis that unifies the entire gait cycle, eliminating the need to switch between controllers during different periods of gait. A reduced-order discrete Fourier transformation (DFT) is used to define virtual constraints that continuously parameterize periodic joint patterns as functions of a mechanical phasing variable. In order to leverage the provable stability properties of hybrid zero dynamics (HZD), hybrid-invariant Bézier polynomials are converted into unified DFT virtual constraints for various walking speeds. Simulations of an amputee biped model show that the unified prosthesis controller approximates the behavior of the original HZD design under ideal scenarios and has advantages over the HZD design when hybrid invariance is violated by mismatches with the human controller. Two implementations of the unified virtual constraints, a feedback linearizing controller, and a more practical joint impedance controller produce similar results in simulation.

Incorporating Human-Like Walking Variability in an HZD-Based Bipedal Model

Predictive simulations of human walking could be used to investigate a wide range of questions. Promising moderately complex models have been developed using the robotics control technique called hybrid zero dynamics (HZD). Existing simulations of human walking only consider the mean motion; therefore, they cannot be used to investigate fall risk, which is correlated with variability. This study determines how to incorporate human-like variability into an HZD-based healthy human model to generate a more realistic gait. The key challenge is determining how to combine the existing mathematical description of variability with the dynamic model so that the biped is still able to walk without falling. To do so, the commanded motion is augmented with a sinusoidal variability function and a polynomial correction function. The variability function captures the variation in joint angles, while the correction function prevents the variability function from growing uncontrollably. The necessity of the correction function and the improvements with a reduction of stance ankle variability are demonstrated via simulations. The variability in temporal measures is shown to be similar to experimental values.

Characterizing and modeling the joint-level variability in human walking

Although human gait is often assumed to be periodic, significant variability exists. This variability appears to provide different information than the underlying periodic signal, particularly about fall risk. Most studies on variability have either used step-to-step metrics such as stride duration or point-wise standard deviations, neither of which explicitly capture the joint-level variability as a function of time. This work demonstrates that a second-order Fourier series for stance joints and a first-order Fourier series for swing joints can accurately capture the variability in joint angles as a function of time on a per-step basis for overground walking at the self-selected speed. It further demonstrates that a total of seven normal distributions, four linear relationships, and twelve continuity constraints can be used to describe how the Fourier series vary between steps. The ability of the proposed method to create curves that match human joint-level variability was evaluated both qualitatively and quantitatively using randomly generated curves.

The Effects of Curved Foot Design Parameters on Planar Biped Walking

Although the nature of their gaits is similar, planar bipeds with curved feet have been shown experimentally to be more energetically efficient than those with point feet. Further, both healthy human feet and prosthetic feet can be modeled as a circular arc with the center of curvature in front of the shank. Thus, understanding the effects of a curved foot’s properties on the energetic cost of gait and on gait kinematics has the potential to improve both bipedal robots and prosthesis design. To date, there has not been a systematic study of the effects of changing the foot radius and center of curvature location on symmetric bipeds. This paper explores the effects of changing the curved foot’s geometric properties for both two- and five-link planar, underactuated bipeds with instantaneous transfer of support at impact. It is found that the foot radius has a substantial effect on the energetic efficiency of a gait regardless of the morphology of the biped. The effect of foot center of curvature location on energy efficiency is dependent on the morphology of the biped and is much less significant than the effect of foot radius. Both the foot radius and center of curvature location affect the knee kinematics of the five-link biped. The foot radius affects the hip kinematics of the two-link biped.Copyright

Prosthetic leg control in the nullspace of human interaction

Recent work has extended the control method of virtual constraints, originally developed for autonomous walking robots, to powered prosthetic legs for lower-limb amputees. Virtual constraints define desired joint patterns as functions of a mechanical phasing variable, which are typically enforced by torque control laws that linearize the output dynamics associated with the virtual constraints. However, the output dynamics of a powered prosthetic leg generally depend on the human interaction forces, which must be measured and canceled by the feedback linearizing control law. This feedback requires expensive multi-axis load cells, and actively canceling the interaction forces may minimize the humans influence over the prosthesis. To address these limitations, this paper proposes a method for projecting virtual constraints into the nullspace of the human interaction terms in the output dynamics. The projected virtual constraints naturally render the output dynamics invariant with respect to the human interaction forces, which instead enter into the internal dynamics of the partially linearized prosthetic system. This method is illustrated with simulations of a transfemoral amputee model walking with a powered knee-ankle prosthesis that is controlled via virtual constraints with and without the proposed projection.