Dollar, Aaron M.Howe, Robert2018-01-242011Dollar, Aaron M, and Robert D Howe. 2011. “Joint Coupling Design of Underactuated Hands for Unstructured Environments.” The International Journal of Robotics Research 30 (9) (June 13): 1157–1169. doi:10.1177/0278364911401441.0278-36491741-3176http://nrs.harvard.edu/urn-3:HUL.InstRepos:34728603This paper examines joint coupling in underactuated robotic grippers for unstructured environments where object properties and location may not be well known. A simplified grasper consisting of a pair of two-link planar fingers with compliant revolute joints was simulated as it grasped a target object. The joint coupling configuration of the gripper was varied in order to maximize successful grasp range and minimize contact forces for a wide range of target object sizes and positions. The number of actuators was also varied in order to test performance for varying degrees of underactuation. A normal distribution of object position was used to model sensing uncertainty and weight the results accordingly. There are three main results: distal/proximal joint torque ratios of around 1.0 produced the best results, both for cases in which sensory information available for the task was poor and when sensing was good; an actuator for each gripper finger performs no better than a single actuator for both fingers; and that for good sensing, the gripper should be positioned off-center from the object, resulting in an increased lever arm and lower unbalanced contact forces on the object.en-USAdaptiverobot graspingrobot handsunderactuatedunstructured environmentsJournal Article10.1177/0278364911401441