Paper ID: 2411.17124

DexGrip: Multi-modal Soft Gripper with Dexterous Grasping and In-hand Manipulation Capacity

Xing Wang, Liam Horrigan, Josh Pinskier, Ge Shi, Vinoth Viswanathan, Lois Liow, Tirthankar Bandyopadhyay, Jen Jen Chung, David Howard

The ability of robotic grippers to not only grasp but also re-position and re-orient objects in-hand is crucial for achieving versatile, general-purpose manipulation. While recent advances in soft robotic grasping has greatly improved grasp quality and stability, their manipulation capabilities remain under-explored. This paper presents the DexGrip, a multi-modal soft robotic gripper for in-hand grasping, re-orientation and manipulation. DexGrip features a 3 Degrees of Freedom (DoFs) active suction palm and 3 active (rotating) grasping surfaces, enabling soft, stable, and dexterous grasping and manipulation without ever needing to re-grasp an object. Uniquely, these features enable complete 360 degree rotation in all three principal axes. We experimentally demonstrate these capabilities across a diverse set of objects and tasks. DexGrip successfully grasped, re-positioned, and re-oriented objects with widely varying stiffnesses, sizes, weights, and surface textures; and effectively manipulated objects that presented significant challenges for existing robotic grippers.

Submitted: Nov 26, 2024