Gastrocnemius and Power Amplifier Soleus Spring-Tendons Achieve Fast Human-like Walking in a Bipedal Robot
ArXiv(2022)
Abstract
Legged locomotion in humans is governed by natural dynamics of the human body and neural control. One mechanism that is assumed to contribute to the high efficiency of human walking is the impulsive ankle push-off, which potentially powers the swing leg catapult. However, the mechanics of the human lower leg with its complex muscle-tendon units spanning over single and multiple joints is not yet understood. Legged robots allow testing the interaction between complex leg mechanics, control, and environment in real-world walking gait. We developed a 0.49m tall, 2.2 kg anthropomorphic bipedal robot with Soleus and Gastrocnemius muscle-tendon units represented by linear springs, acting as mono- and biarticular elastic structures around the robot's ankle and knee joints. We tested the influence of three Soleus and Gastrocnemius spring-tendon configurations on the ankle power curves, the coordination of the ankle and knee joint movements, the total cost of transport, and walking speed. We controlled the robot with a feed-forward central pattern generator, leading to walking speeds between 0.35 m/s and 0.57 m/s at 1.0 Hz locomotion frequency, at 0.35m leg length. We found differences between all three configurations; the Soleus spring-tendon modulates the robot's speed and energy efficiency likely by ankle power amplification, while the Gastrocnemius spring-tendon changes the movement coordination between ankle and knee joints during push-off.
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Key words
ankle power amplification,ankle power curves,anthropomorphic bipedal robot,biarticular elastic structures,complex leg mechanics,complex muscle-tendon units,feedforward central pattern generator,frequency 1.0 Hz,Gastrocnemius spring-tendon changes,human body,human lower leg,human walking,knee joint movements,leg length,legged locomotion,legged robots,linear springs,mass 2.2 kg,monoarticular elastic structures,neural control,real-world walking gait,size 0.35 m,size 0.49 m,Soleus muscle-tendon units,Soleus spring-tendon modulates,swing leg catapult,velocity 0.35 m/s to 0.57 m/s,walking speed
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