ArXiv TLDR

Safe Human-to-Humanoid Motion Imitation Using Control Barrier Functions

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2604.11447

Wenqi Cai, John Abanes, Nikolaos Evangeliou, Anthony Tzes

cs.ROeess.SY

TLDR

This paper introduces a vision-based framework for safe human-to-humanoid motion imitation, using Control Barrier Functions to prevent collisions.

Key contributions

  • Vision-based framework for humanoid robots to safely imitate human movements.
  • Captures human skeletal keypoints via a single camera for motion retargeting.
  • Utilizes a Control Barrier Function (CBF) layer (QP) for real-time safety enforcement.
  • CBF filters commands to prevent both robot self-collisions and human-robot collisions.

Why it matters

Ensuring safety in human-robot interaction is crucial for widespread humanoid adoption. This paper offers a real-time, vision-based solution using Control Barrier Functions to prevent collisions during motion imitation, making human-robot collaboration safer and more practical.

Original Abstract

Ensuring operational safety is critical for human-to-humanoid motion imitation. This paper presents a vision-based framework that enables a humanoid robot to imitate human movements while avoiding collisions. Human skeletal keypoints are captured by a single camera and converted into joint angles for motion retargeting. Safety is enforced through a Control Barrier Function (CBF) layer formulated as a Quadratic Program (QP), which filters imitation commands to prevent both self-collisions and human-robot collisions. Simulation results validate the effectiveness of the proposed framework for real-time collision-aware motion imitation.

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