To meet the demand for generalized application of robot, we developed a compact lightweight anthropomorphic 7-axis manipulator to deal with various tasks, such as patrol, manufacturing, elder-care etc. Compared to the common 6-axis manipulators, the 7-axis arm has one redundant degree of freedom to avoid obstacles in restricted area. The weight of one manipulator is less than 15 kilograms. As a result, it’s easy to integrate with automated guided vehicle to enlarge the application fields. The payload of this 7-axis manipulator is 5 kg, which is the same as the other common industrial manipulators. Except the weight of the gripper mounted on the end-effector, this manipulator is able to handle most of the objects in daily life. Also, we developed a vision system to track multiple objects and design a rotating platform to expand the filed of vision. By the technique of the real-time eye-hand calibration, the manipulator could reach where the camera perceives and pick the specific object.

The compact lightweight 7-axis manipulator has been presented by the cooperation between NTHU and ITRI. Compared to the common 6-axis manipulators, the 7-axis arm has one redundant degree of freedom to avoid obstacles in restricted area. We also developed AI object detection and real-time eye-hand calibration technique, which were integrated into dual-arm anthropomorphic robot. With the technology of vision servoing, the robot could extend the field of vision, track the specific object and pick the object by rotating the camera, just like a human’s neck. By the techniques mentioned above, the manipulators could not only execute the fixed given motion but also automatically generate path according to different fields and tasks.

Dual-arm humanoid robot could be applied to many scenarios to execute different tasks. It could be roughly divided into two fields. In industrial applications, the robot could carry out the dangerous work like welding or spraying, which are harmful to human’s health. It could also perform the task of picking and classification if the vision module is used. On the other hand, for household applications, the dual-arm robot plays an important role in the service robot and the homecare robot. The anthropomorphic design is very suitable for the tasks in daily life. It could have more applications if automated guided vehicles are utilized. For example, elder-care, preservation and housework etc.