Differentiable Simulation of Soft Robots with Frictional Contacts

Fuente: arXiv
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Autori principali: Ménager, Etienne, Montaut, Louis, Lidec, Quentin Le, Carpentier, Justin
Natura: Preprint
Pubblicazione: 2025
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author Ménager, Etienne
Montaut, Louis
Lidec, Quentin Le
Carpentier, Justin
author_facet Ménager, Etienne
Montaut, Louis
Lidec, Quentin Le
Carpentier, Justin
contents In recent years, soft robotics simulators have evolved to offer various functionalities, including the simulation of different material types (e.g., elastic, hyper-elastic) and actuation methods (e.g., pneumatic, cable-driven, servomotor). These simulators also provide tools for various tasks, such as calibration, design, and control. However, efficiently and accurately computing derivatives within these simulators remains a challenge, particularly in the presence of physical contact interactions. Incorporating these derivatives can, for instance, significantly improve the convergence speed of control methods like reinforcement learning and trajectory optimization, enable gradient-based techniques for design, or facilitate end-to-end machine-learning approaches for model reduction. This paper addresses these challenges by introducing a unified method for computing the derivatives of mechanical equations within the finite element method framework, including contact interactions modeled as a nonlinear complementarity problem. The proposed approach handles both collision and friction phases, accounts for their nonsmooth dynamics, and leverages the sparsity introduced by mesh-based models. Its effectiveness is demonstrated through several examples of controlling and calibrating soft systems.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2501_18956
institution arXiv
publishDate 2025
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Differentiable Simulation of Soft Robots with Frictional Contacts
Ménager, Etienne
Montaut, Louis
Lidec, Quentin Le
Carpentier, Justin
Robotics
In recent years, soft robotics simulators have evolved to offer various functionalities, including the simulation of different material types (e.g., elastic, hyper-elastic) and actuation methods (e.g., pneumatic, cable-driven, servomotor). These simulators also provide tools for various tasks, such as calibration, design, and control. However, efficiently and accurately computing derivatives within these simulators remains a challenge, particularly in the presence of physical contact interactions. Incorporating these derivatives can, for instance, significantly improve the convergence speed of control methods like reinforcement learning and trajectory optimization, enable gradient-based techniques for design, or facilitate end-to-end machine-learning approaches for model reduction. This paper addresses these challenges by introducing a unified method for computing the derivatives of mechanical equations within the finite element method framework, including contact interactions modeled as a nonlinear complementarity problem. The proposed approach handles both collision and friction phases, accounts for their nonsmooth dynamics, and leverages the sparsity introduced by mesh-based models. Its effectiveness is demonstrated through several examples of controlling and calibrating soft systems.
title Differentiable Simulation of Soft Robots with Frictional Contacts
topic Robotics
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2501.18956