Biped walking stabilization based on gait analysis

Abstract

This paper describes a walking stabilization control based on gait analysis for a biped humanoid robot. We have developed a human-like foot mechanism mimicking the medial longitudinal arch to clarify the function of the foot arch structure. To evaluate the arch function through walking experiments using a robot, a walking stabilization control should also be designed based on gait analysis. Physiologists suggest the ankle, hip and stepping strategies, but these strategies are proposed by measuring human beings who are not “walking” but “standing” against force disturbances. Therefore, first we conducted gait analysis in this study, and we modeled human walking strategy enough to be implemented on humanoid robots. We obtained following two findings from gait analysis: i) a foot-landing point exists on the line joining the stance leg and the projected point of CoM on the ground, and ii) the distance between steps is modified to keep mechanical energy at the landing within a certain value. A walking stabilization control is designed based on the gait analysis. Verification of the proposed control is conducted through experiments with a human-sized humanoid robot WABIAN-2R. The experimental videos are supplemented.