Pinch Grasp and Suction for Delicate Object Manipulations Using Modular Anthropomorphic Robotic Gripper with Soft Layer Enhancements

This paper is an extension of our previous work about a modular anthropomorphic robotic hand with soft enhancements focusing on simultaneous pinch grasp and suction-based object manipulations. The base structure is a tendon-driven robotic hand comprising five fingers and a palm. Each finger consists of two rigid links covered with soft enhancements. The soft enhancements are like the skin and tissues of the robotic hand. The tip of the finger is equipped with a suction module which can be actuated by regulating negative pressure to the soft layers. While our previous work dealt with the rationale behind and the structure of the modular design with kinematic analysis, this paper focuses on analyzing two specific capabilities of the gripper—pinch grasp and suction modality. Experiments validate that the proposed gripper together with the soft enhancement layers is capable of performing delicate single finger suction-based manipulation tasks and two-finger pinch grasp tasks.