Distributed Manipulation Using Large-Scale Actuator Networks

The field of Large-Scale Actuator Networks (LSANs) is a class of cyber-physical systems that is growing rapidly.One key application of LSANs is distributed manipulation.Distributed manipulation is a revolutionary application of this technology in the industrial sector.Examples of distributed manipulation include: vibrating plates, arrays of air jets, and mobile multi-robot teams.This paper explores a dynamic surface that adapts its shape by using an autonomous array of linear actuators to translate an object.This collective of actuators overcomes the limitations of the single degree of freedom that each actuator possesses, and results in a system that has many degrees of freedom.The experimental results illustrate the utility of this technique.