Introduction: Anatomy of a

Manipulation System

MIT 6.4210/2: Robotic Manipulation

Fall 2023, Lecture 1

Follow live at https://slides.com/d/sE8qYNg/live​

(or later at https://slides.com/russtedrake/fall23-lec01)

Course Info

Website: http://manipulation.mit.edu

6.4210 is a CI-M (Communication Intensive in the Major)

Communications Instructors from Comparative Media Studies/Writing

Recitations Fridays afternoons (starting Sept 15)

Logistics

• Students: Make sure you're on Piazza
  • CI-M (6.4210) material on Canvas.
• Review the course guidelines.
• Read/comment on the lecture notes

• ~ weekly problem sets throughout the class, due Wed.
  • ​Problem Set 1 released tomorrow (on the course calendar).
• Final project.

from the course website:

Today

• What do I mean by "manipulation"? (with examples!)
• The systems theory perspective
• Anatomy of a manipulation system
• Goals for the course

Matt Mason says

• Definition 1 (etymological). Manipulation refers to the activities performed by hands.
• ...
• Definition 5. Manipulation refers to an agent’s control of its environment through selective contact.

Matthew T. Mason.  Toward Robotic Manipulation.  Annual Review of Control, Robotics, and Autonomous Systems, 1:1-28, 2018.

Autonomous "Open-world" Manipulation

• Definition 5. Manipulation refers to an agent’s control of its environment through selective contact.

• Even broader: "Open-world" manipulation requires:
  • rich perceptual understanding of the environment,
  • "common-sense" understanding of objects,
  • the ability to make long-term (task-level) plans, and combine them with fine (joint-level) motions.

Motivation

Consider the task of loading a dishwasher...

(One project I've worked on at TRI Robotics)

Low-level feedback control from cameras / sensors

(continuous time/state/action)

Scene-understanding +

Task-level Planning

(discrete/symbolic)

The world is even more "open" when the manipulation system goes mobile.

Manipulation from the dynamics and controls perspective...

How important is feedback in manipulation?

The complexities of grasping in the wild.  Nakamura et al, Humanoids, 2017

The complexities of grasping in the wild.  Nakamura et al, Humanoids, 2017

To be clear: we're not just controlling the arm

Levine*, Finn*, Darrel, Abbeel, JMLR 2016 

Visuomotor policies

perception network

(often pre-trained)

other robot sensors

learned state representation

Manipulation is much more than "pick and place"!

The anatomy of a modern manipulation system

What is Drake?

drake.mit.edu

Also:

https://github.com/RobotLocomotion/drake-ros

https://github.com/RobotLocomotion/drake-external-examples

...

Logistics

• Students: Make sure you're on Piazza
  • CI-M (6.4210) material on Canvas.
• Review the course guidelines.
• Read/comment on the lecture notes

• ~ weekly problem sets throughout the class, due Wed.
  • ​Problem Set 1 released tomorrow (on the course calendar).
• Final project.