Engineers developed a ping-pong-playing robot that quickly estimates the speed and trajectory of an incoming ball and precisely hits it to a desired location on the table.
In addition to training future players, the technology could expand the capabilities of other humanoid robots, such as for search and rescue
Now, the team is looking to increase the robot's playing radius so that it can return a wider variety of shots. Then, they envision the setup could be a viable competitor in the growing field of smart robotic training systems. "If you think of the spectrum of control problems in robotics, we have on one end manipulation, which is usually slow and very precise, such as picking up an object and making sure you're grasping it well. On the other end, you have locomotion, which is about being dynamic and adapting to perturbations in your system," Nguyen explains."Ping pong sits in between those.
The team fixed the robotic arm to a table at one end of a standard ping pong table and set up high-speed motion capture cameras around the table to track balls that are bounced at the robot. They also developed optimal control algorithms that predict, based on the principles of math and physics, what speed and paddle orientation the arm should execute to hit an incoming ball with a particular type of swing: loop , drive , or chop .
"Some of the goal of this project is to say we can reach the same level of athleticism that people have," Nguyen says."And in terms of strike speed, we're getting really, really close."
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