Minimum-jerk trajectory generation for master-slave robotic system

This paper describes a trajectory generation method for a master-slave surgical robotic system. Because the data from the master system is intermittent due the limited master-slave communication rate, interpolation is required to achieve smooth motion of the slave robot. In particular, real-time interpolation is crucial for surgical systems. To cope with this problem, we propose a new smooth trajectory generation method by minimizing jerk using a quintic B-spline. To ensure the third-order continuity in position, velocity, and acceleration, the trajectory of the next time segment is generated using several fictive control points. In addition, we impose a minimum jerk constraint to obtain a smooth trajectory. The proposed method was tested and compared with a conventional trajectory generation method. The experimental results showed that the proposed method generated a smoother trajectory with fewer jerks to an extent that the method is sufficient for use in real-time control of a surgical robotic system.