In this paper the design of a biped robot actuated with Shape Memory Alloy (SMA) springs with minimum degrees of freedom is presented. SMA springs are a class of smart materials that are known for their high power to mass and volume ratios. It was shown that utilizing spring type of SMAs have many advantages as large deformation, smooth motion, silent and clean movement compared to ordinary typ...

This paper discusses a general formulation both in kinematics and dynamics for under-actuated manipulator systems, represented by a freejoint manipulator, a free-floating manipulator, a flexible-base manipulator and a flexible-arm manipulator. We highlight the fact that a concept, originally developed for a particular system, is applicable to the others as well because the dynamic equations of ...

This paper proposed a design idea of a novel under-actuated finger mechanism, and analyzed its principle and designed the finger mechanism. The finger is designed based on a gear-rack mechanism, spring constraint and particular active middle-segment, which is passively adaptive in grasping objects. A new multi-fingered hand named as TH-3R Hand is designed based on the finger. TH-3R Hand has 5 f...