Supervisory control of periodic stepping motion of a bipedal robot

This paper proposes a new model for bipedal robot, which takes account of not only the continuous dynamics but also discreteness of periodic motion. To capture the discrete behavior of periodic motion, the model of bipedal robot is expressed as an event driven model, which is frequently employed to express discrete event systems. Additionally, supervisory control framework, which is a technique to control discrete event systems, is utilized to design a controller for the stepping motion known as one of simple periodic motions. Through experiments using a real bipedal robot, the relation between control inputs and synchronizability of supervisor and plant is investigated.