Region-Reaching Control of a Flexible-Joint Manipulator

Abstract This paper addresses the region-reaching control problem for a flexible-joint robotic manipulator which is formulated by Lagrangian dynamics. An adaptive control scheme is proposed for the manipulator system having two constrained regions which are constructed by selecting appropriate objective functions. The two joints of the flexible-joint manipulator can be, respectively, confined in different regions, and this gives more flexibility than the traditional fixed-point tracking control. By performing a straightforward Lyapunov stability analysis, a simple control algorithm is established to provide a solution for the region-reaching control problem. Finally, numerical simulations are given to validate the theoretical results.