%0 Book Section %B Proceedings of the International Symposium on Robotics Research %D 2003 %T Variable Stiffness Actuators for Fast and Safe Motion Control %A A. Bicchi %A G. Tonietti %A M. Bavaro %A M. Piccigallo %E B. Siciliano %E O. Khatib %E Groen, F. %K Robotics %X

In this paper we propose Variable Stiffness actuation as a viable mechanical/control co-design approach for guaranteeing control performance for robot arms that are inherently safe to humans in their environment. A new actuator under development in our Lab is then proposed, which incorporate the possibility to vary transmission stiffness during motion execution, thus allowing substantial motion speed-up while maintaining low injury risk levels.

%B Proceedings of the International Symposium on Robotics Research %S Springer Tracts in Advanced Robotics (STAR) %I Springer Verlag %G eng