SLIPPING AND TRIPPING REFLEXES FOR BIPEDAL ROBOTS

Many robot applications require legged robots to traverse rough or unm odeled terrain. This paper explores strategies that would enable legge d robots to respond to two common types of surface contact error: slip ping and tripping. Because of the rapid response required and the diff iculty of sensing uneven terrain, we propose a set of reflexes that wo uld permit the robot to react without modeling or analyzing the error condition in detail. These reflexive responses allow robust recovery f rom a variety of contact errors. We present simulation trials for sing le-slip tasks with varying coefficients of friction and single-trip ta sks with varying obstacle heights.