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SAPHARI NMMI
WINTER SCHOOL

Rome, February 20-25, 2015

 

The school will feature classes on the basics of Soft Robotics design and control, and will allow extensive hands-on sessions on physical variable-stiffness robots.

 

The school's climax will be a final competition among student teams on a challenging task to be performed by a soft robot, demonstrating performance superior to rigid robots.

 

The winning team will be awarded with a qbmate, the 12 dof variable stiffness humanoid torso produced by qbrobotics following the Natural Machine Motion Initiative open-hardware design.

 

In-class lecture topics will include:

 

  • Introduction to Soft Robotics

  • Elements of Human Motor Control

  • Variable Stiffness Actuators from the User's Point of View

  • Control Basics for Soft Robots

  • Joint-space and Cartesian Impedance Control

  • Optimal Control of Variable Stiffness Actuators

  • Stiffness and Impedance Estimation  

 

Speakers:

 

 

Basic knowledge of robotics (a first course on kinematics, dynamics, control) is assumed.
Programming skills in Matlab and other languages are also assumed.

 

Hands-on experience will be gained on real VSA actuators. Participants will form teams equipped with a kit of actuators, boards, flanges, batteries etc. at disposal for the whole week. Teams will have access to all open-source HW and SW code available on the NMMI platform, and are expected to share the code/applications/examples they will develop on the same platform.

 

Registration is free for the whole event, including coffee breaks. Because of the hands-on nature of the school, the number of attendees will be limited. Therefore, there will be a selection of applicants on the basis of their CV and motivations. Admission notifications will be sent via e-mail by February 5th.

 

The school will be held at the Auditorium Antonianum, within walking distance from the Ancient Rome's Forum and Colosseum.

 

 

List of the Hotels and B&Bs nearby the Auditorium Antonianum and the Department of Information and Automation Engineering "Antonio Ruberti" (DIAG)

 

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