Mobile manipulation with a kinematically redundant manipulator for a pick-and-place scenario

Mobile robots and robotic manipulators have traditionally been used separately performing different types of tasks. For example, industrial robots have typically been programmed to follow trajectories using position sensors. If combining the two types of robots and adding sensors new possibilities emerge. This enables new applications, but it also raises the question of how to combine the sensors and the added kinematic complexity. An omni-directional mobile robot together with a new type of kinematically redundant manipulator for future use as a service robot for grocery stores is proposed. The scenario is that of distributing groceries on refilling shelves, and a constraint-based task specification methodology to incorporate sensors and geometric uncertainties into the task is employed. Sensor fusion is used to estimate the pose of the mobile base online. Force sensors are utilized to resolve remaining uncertainties. The approach is verified with experiments.