# overview
While advances in lightweight, backdrivable hardware are pushing wearable and other physically-interactive robots toward applications in everyday life, the way these robots are controlled today limits them in a fundamental way. From assistive lower-body exoskeletons to interactive co-bot arms, today's controllers rely on knowledge of the task (e.g. walking or assembling furniture) to make assumptions about what the operator wants and will do. Although the goal of these robots is ultimately to achieve the breadth of tasks and fluidity of transitions that a person has, the field has adopted a paradigm in which controllers are designed to ignore transitions. In so doing, we have left the problem of transitions to a high-level AI classifier, without necessarily considering the responsiveness, stability, or reliability of the classifier's feedback interaction with the wearer. Stated simply, real-time controllers are ignoring the human's input, when it should actually be the most important input. Fully exploiting the frameworks of estimation and control theory, on the other hand, offers the potential to allow humans to control robots directly, through physical interaction that amplifies their intent--empowering people with the strength of machines. The Human-Empowering Robotics and Control (HERC) Lab in the Mike J. Walker '66 Department of Mechanical Engineering at Texas A&M University aims to bridge this gap between estimation and control theory and physically interactive robotics to pursue fully-task-invariant feedback systems that augment human capabilities.

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4007 Control Engineering, Mechatronics And Robotics

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3403 Macromolecular And Materials Chemistry

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4007 Control Engineering, Mechatronics And Robotics

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4007 Control Engineering, Mechatronics And Robotics

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4007 Control Engineering, Mechatronics And Robotics

# keywords[]
4007 Control Engineering, Mechatronics And Robotics

# keywords[]
4007 Control Engineering, Mechatronics And Robotics

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4007 Control Engineering, Mechatronics And Robotics

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4607 Graphics, Augmented Reality And Games

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4007 Control Engineering, Mechatronics And Robotics

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4007 Control Engineering, Mechatronics And Robotics

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4201 Allied Health And Rehabilitation Science

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4007 Control Engineering, Mechatronics And Robotics

# keywords[]
4007 Control Engineering, Mechatronics And Robotics

# publications[].label
Analysis of the Bayesian Gait-State Estimation Problem for Lower-Limb Wearable Robot Sensor Configurations.

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Exploiting the Natural Dynamics of Series Elastic Robots by Actuator-Centered Sequential Linear Programming

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An Energy-Dense Two-Part Torsion Spring Architecture and Design Tool

# publications[].publisher
Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE)

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Optimally Biomimetic Passivity-Based Control of a Lower-Limb Exoskeleton Over the Primary Activities of Daily Life.

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Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE)

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Adaptive Compliance Shaping with Human Impedance Estimation

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Biological Joint Loading and Exoskeleton Design

# publications[].publisher
Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE)

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Complex Stiffness Model of Physical Human-Robot Interaction: Implications for Control of Performance Augmentation Exoskeletons

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A Complex Stiffness Human Impedance Model with Customizable Exoskeleton Control

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Characterization of a Quasi-Direct Drive Knee Perturbation System For Mechanical Impedance Estimation

# publications[].publisher
Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE)

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A Modular Framework for Task-Invariant, Energy Shaping Control of Lower-Limb Exoskeletons

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The Economic Value of Augmentative Exoskeletons and their Assistance

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Quadric Inclusion Programs: An LMI Approach to H-Model Identification

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A Complex Stiffness Human Impedance Model With Customizable Exoskeleton Control.

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Empirically Compensated Setpoint Tracking for Spherical Robots with Pressurized Soft-Shells

# publications[].publisher
Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE)

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Modeling and Loop Shaping of Single-Joint Amplification Exoskeleton with Contact Sensing and Series Elastic Actuation

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A Modular Framework for Task-Agnostic, Energy Shaping Control of Lower Limb Exoskeletons

# publications[].publisher
Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE)

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Can humans perceive the metabolic benefit provided by augmentative exoskeletons?

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Compliance Shaping for Control of Strength Amplification Exoskeletons with Elastic Cuffs

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Real-Time Gait Phase and Task Estimation for Controlling a Powered Ankle Exoskeleton on Extremely Uneven Terrain.

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Enhancing Voluntary Motion with Modular, Backdrivable, Powered Hip and Knee Orthoses.

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Robust Estimator-Based Safety Verification: A Vector Norm Approach

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Safety Control Synthesis with Input Limits: a Hybrid Approach

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A Compensated Open-Loop Impedance Controller Evaluated on the Second-Generation Open-Source Leg Prosthesis

# publications[].publisher
Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE)

# publications[].label
A versatile knee exoskeleton mitigates quadriceps fatigue in lifting, lowering, and carrying tasks.

# publications[].publisher
American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS)

# publications[].label
Enhancing Voluntary Motion with Modular, Backdrivable, Powered Hip and Knee Orthoses

# publications[].label
A Control Framework for Accurate Mechanical Impedance Rendering with Series-Elastic Joints in Prosthetic Actuation Applications

# publications[].publisher
Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE)

# publications[].label
The Economic Value of Augmentative Exoskeletons and their Assistance

# publications[].label
A Modular Framework for Task-Invariant, Energy Shaping Control of Lower-Limb Exoskeletons

# publications[].label
Robustification of Bayesian-Inference-Based Gait Estimation for Lower-Limb Wearable Robots

# publications[].label
Quadric Inclusion Programs: an LMI Approach to H[infinity]-Model Identification

# websites[].label
Human-Empowering Robotics and Control Lab