Previous Courses and Summer Schools

IDETC 2022 Workshops

Title: A Computational and Physical Framework for Mechanisms and Robot Motion Design

Organizer: Anurag Purwar; Stony Brook University

Description: This workshop will introduce attendees to a new computational framework for mechanism and robot motion design and a physical robot prototyping kit using which students and practitioners can design one- and multiple-degrees of freedom mechanisms and physically realize them. The computational framework brings together machine learning with machine design to solve motion generation and path synthesis problem for mechanism design. Attendees will get hands-on exposure to a web-based motion design software tool called MotionGen Pro and a robot hardware called SnappyXO Design, both developed at Stony Brook University to support the needs of students in classes, such as Freshman Design Innovation, Kinematics of Machinery, Mechatronics, and Robotics. While the hardware serves as a reference hardware, the software also allows exporting robot part geometry for laser-cutting or 3D printing.

Title: Getting the right model of your robot in an easy way using modern geometric methods

Organizer: Andreas Mueller; Johannes Kepler University

Description: A fundamental prerequisite for control and design of dexterous robots such as serial and parallel manipulators, humanoids, space robots is are kinematics and dynamics models with sufficient level of fidelity and complexity. Four decades of research on multibody dynamics has led to systematic modeling approaches for complex systems. Recent research elevated these results to a more concise level by means of Lie group methods. These "modern" approaches make use of the differential geometry of rigid body motions, i.e. screw motions. The coordinate invariance of such formulations not only makes the modeling extremely handy but also leads to computationally efficient formulations. This is true for robotic systems with arbitrary topology. Moreover, the geometric approach allows for compact relations for higher-order derivatives of the kinematics and dynamics model, which is necessary for flatness based control of robots actuated with serial elastic actuators and soft robots. A salient feature of geometric modeling approaches is their ease of use, which allows for straightforward manual implementation for specific robots as well as for the programing of general purpose simulators.

In this tutorial, modern modeling approach are introduced to a wider audience in form of a hands-on introduction. The tutorial is interactive, and accompanied with computer exercises. Attendees are requested to bring their own computer with installed Mathematics or Maple.

Past Kinematics Summer Schools

Date: August 17-18, 2019

Venue: Hilton Anaheim, CA

Website: https://sites.google.com/stonybrook.edu/2019kiss/home

Videos: https://sites.google.com/stonybrook.edu/2019kiss/videos

Date: August 20-21, 2016

Venue: Westin Charlotte, Charlotte, NC

Website: https://sites.google.com/a/illinois.edu/kinematics-summer-school-2016/home

Archive: https://sites.tntech.edu/scanfield/mr-summer-school-16-compliant-mechanisms/

Date: August 15-16, 2014

Venue: University at Buffalo, Buffalo, NY

Website/archive: https://sites.google.com/a/stonybrook.edu/kinematics-summer-school/

Videos: https://sites.google.com/a/stonybrook.edu/kinematics-summer-school/videos

International Summer School on Screw-Theory Based Methods in Robotics

Date: 28 August to 5 September 2016

Website: http://www.summerscrews.org/

Venue: École de technologie supérieure (ÉTS), Montreal, Canada