Embedded solutions for a class of highly unstable, underactuated and self-balancing robotic systems

This paper presents a didactic framework in embedded electronics systems that is used to elicit awareness into students and engineers on the design issues arising in the realization of a class of underactuated robots and aerial vehicles that needs be robustly controlled due to their intrinsic unstability. The applications prototyped on the embedded platform presented here are conceived, by design, to be compliant with tiny collaborative robotics applications in order to adhere to the needs of the complex cyber-physical systems problem. The proposed platform is self-contained with on-board sensing and computation. Its engineering uses only off-the-shelf and mass production components. The system is based on a general purpose embedded board equipped with a 32-bit microcontroller which is able to manage all the basic tasks of this robotic platform: sensing, actuation, control and communication. The framework is described, and initial experimental results are introduced. Three applications are presented in this work as a validation of the methodology: a ballbot robot, a legged robot and a quadrotor aerial vehicle. The chosen case studies are robotics applications that are specialized in performing maneuvers when operating in tight spaces as in the human living environments. © 2016, Bonci et al.