Underactuated Robotics

Underactuated Robotics

23 episodes

Robots today move far too conservatively, using control systems that attempt to maintain full control authority at all times. Humans and animals move much more aggressively by routinely executing motions which involve a loss of instantaneous control authority. Controlling nonlinear systems without complete control authority requires methods that can reason about and exploit the natural dynamics of our machines. This course discusses nonlinear dynamics and control of underactuated mechanical systems, with an emphasis on machine learning methods. Topics include nonlinear dynamics of passive robots (walkers, swimmers, flyers), motion planning, partial feedback linearization, energy-shaping control, analytical optimal control, reinforcement learning/approximate optimal control, and the influence of mechanical design on control. Discussions include examples from biology and applications to legged locomotion, compliant manipulation, underwater robots, and flying machines. License: Creative Commons BY-NC-SA

Podcasts

Lecture 22: Actor-Critic methods

Published: April 9, 2015, 5:05 p.m.
Duration: 1 hour 10 minutes 49 seconds

Listed in: Technology

Lecture 23: Case studies in computational underactuated control

Published: April 9, 2015, 5:04 p.m.
Duration: 1 hour 2 minutes 11 seconds

Listed in: Technology

Lecture 21: Policy improvement

Published: April 9, 2015, 5:01 p.m.
Duration: 1 hour 15 minutes 39 seconds

Listed in: Technology

Lecture 20: Temporal difference learning with function approximation

Published: April 9, 2015, 5:01 p.m.
Duration: 1 hour 17 minutes 44 seconds

Listed in: Technology

Lecture 19: Temporal difference learning

Published: April 9, 2015, 5:01 p.m.
Duration: 1 hour 19 minutes 24 seconds

Listed in: Technology

Lecture 12: Walking (continued)

Published: April 9, 2015, 5 p.m.
Duration: 1 hour 11 minutes 30 seconds

Listed in: Technology

Lecture 18: Stochastic Gradient Descent 2

Published: April 9, 2015, 5 p.m.
Duration: 1 hour 18 minutes 43 seconds

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Lecture 16: Introducing stochastic optimal control

Published: April 9, 2015, 5 p.m.
Duration: 1 hour 23 minutes 33 seconds

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Lecture 17: Stochastic Gradient Descent

Published: April 9, 2015, 5 p.m.
Duration: 1 hour 16 minutes 36 seconds

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Lecture 10: Trajectory stabilization and iterative linear quadratic regulator (iLQR)

Published: April 9, 2015, 4:59 p.m.
Duration: 1 hour 19 minutes 51 seconds

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Lecture 11: Walking

Published: April 9, 2015, 4:59 p.m.
Duration: 1 hour 15 minutes 51 seconds

Listed in: Technology

Lecture 8: Dynamic programming (DP) and policy search

Published: April 9, 2015, 4:58 p.m.
Duration: 1 hour 14 minutes

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Lecture 9: Trajectory optimization

Published: April 9, 2015, 4:58 p.m.
Duration: 1 hour 9 minutes 6 seconds

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Lecture 15: Global policies from local policies

Published: April 9, 2015, 4:58 p.m.
Duration: 1 hour 18 minutes 28 seconds

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Lecture 14: Feasible motion planning

Published: April 9, 2015, 4:57 p.m.
Duration: 1 hour 13 minutes 54 seconds

Listed in: Technology

Lecture 13: Running

Published: April 9, 2015, 4:56 p.m.
Duration: 57 minutes 32 seconds

Listed in: Technology

Lecture 4: Optimal control of the double integrator (continued)

Published: April 9, 2015, 4:55 p.m.
Duration: 1 hour 24 minutes 53 seconds

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Lecture 7: Swing-up control of acrobot and cart-pole systems

Published: April 9, 2015, 4:54 p.m.
Duration: 1 hour 5 minutes 24 seconds

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Lecture 5: Numerical optimal control (dynamic programming)

Published: April 9, 2015, 4:54 p.m.
Duration: 1 hour 12 minutes 42 seconds

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Lecture 3: Optimal control of the double integrator

Published: April 9, 2015, 4:53 p.m.
Duration: 1 hour 16 minutes 43 seconds

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Lecture 6: Acrobot and cart-pole

Published: April 9, 2015, 4:53 p.m.
Duration: 1 hour 20 minutes 10 seconds

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Lecture 2: The Simple Pendulum

Published: April 9, 2015, 4:53 p.m.
Duration: 1 hour 8 minutes 59 seconds

Listed in: Technology

Lecture 1: Introduction

Published: April 9, 2015, 4:50 p.m.
Duration: 1 hour 14 minutes 11 seconds

Listed in: Technology