Development of a self-contained robotic hand with dexterous grasping capabilities for research applications

This is the authors' abstract. We don't add key points for this paper.

Thumb loss can diminish one's hand's functionality by up to 40% and the loss of one's entire hand can severely impact a person's ability to perform simple day-to-day tasks. Therefore, there exists a need to focus on the development of a thumb mechanism which supports dexterous grasping activities in anthropomorphic robotic hands. This paper documents the design process of a novel robotic hand, and shows experimental results validating its overall performance. A large focus was placed on developing a novel thumb mechanism which could replicate the thumb's characteristic movement types, namely flexion-extension, abduction-adduction, and oppositionreposition. Additional focus was placed on developing a mechanism for flexion-extension movement of the fingers which did not incorporate passive components and on producing a fully self-contained prototype — with the electronics and actuators contained inside the palm, and the power supply inset against the back of the palm. The hand successfully followed motion commands from a sensor glove, and was able to replicate 14 grasp configurations which demonstrated its dexterous grasping abilities.