IEEE Robotics & Automation Magazine - December 2018 - 45

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A Soft
Modular End
Effector for
Underwater
Manipulation

A Gentle, Adaptable Grasp for the Ocean Depths
By Domenico Mura, Manuel Barbarossa, Giacomo Dinuzzi,
Giorgio Grioli, Andrea Caiti, and Manuel G. Catalano

C

urrent underwater end-effector technology has
limits in terms of finesse and versatility. Because
of this, the execution of several underwater
operations, such as archeological recovery and
biological sampling, often still requires direct
intervention by human operators, exposing them to the
risks of working in a difficult environment. This article proposes the design and implementation of an underactuated
and compliant underwater end effector that embodies grasp
capabilities comparable to those of a scuba's real hand as
well as the large grasping envelope of grippers.
The proposed end effector (Figure 1), with a design based
on the Pisa/IIT SoftHand, is composed of a watertight modular chamber with pressure compensation-hosting the

Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/MRA.2018.2871350
Date of publication: 29 October 2018

1070-9932/18©2018IEEE

electronics and motor-and of a set of two soft terminal
devices that implement an adaptive grasping function, one
with an anthropomorphic hand form and one with a gripper-like form for medium/small and large object manipulation, respectively. These devices have been tested in a
laboratory to withstand a pressure of 50 bar without damage
or degradation in performance and are readily interchangeable through a custom fast tool change system.
The two parts are connected via a magnetic drive coupling to transfer actuator torque to the wet fingers. Field
results, obtained with the end effector controlled underwater by a human operator (10-m depth), show good
grasping performance in terms of both dexterity and
force tasks. Moreover, preliminary laboratory testing shows
the possibility of implementing basic yet meaningful
intrinsic force sensing for the reconstruction of fundamental grasp interactions.
december 2018

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IEEE ROBOTICS & AUTOMATION MAGAZINE

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IEEE Robotics & Automation Magazine - December 2018

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of IEEE Robotics & Automation Magazine - December 2018

Contents
IEEE Robotics & Automation Magazine - December 2018 - Cover1
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