eoh system
KARL: Kalman-Filter Assisted Reinforcement Learner for Dynamic Object Tracking and Grasping
Boyalakuntla, Kowndinya, Boularias, Abdeslam, Yu, Jingjin
-- We present Kalman-filter Assisted Reinforcement Learner (KARL) for dynamic object tracking and grasping over eye-on-hand (EoH) systems, significantly expanding such systems' capabilities in challenging, realistic environments. In comparison to the previous state-of-the-art, KARL (1) incorporates a novel six-stage RL curriculum that doubles the system's motion range, thereby greatly enhancing the system's grasping performance, (2) integrates a robust Kalman filter layer between the perception and reinforcement learning (RL) control modules, enabling the system to maintain an uncertain but continuous 6D pose estimate even when the target object temporarily exits the camera's field-of-view or undergoes rapid, unpredictable motion, and (3) introduces mechanisms to allow retries to gracefully recover from unavoidable policy execution failures. Extensive evaluations conducted in both simulation and real-world experiments qualitatively and quantitatively corroborate KARL's advantage over earlier systems, achieving higher grasp success rates and faster robot execution speed. Source code and supplementary materials for KARL will be made available at: https://github.com/arc-l/karl . Humans, and animals in general, interact with the physical world through observing and handling everyday objects [1], which makes object tracking and manipulation arguably the most fundamental skill for physical intelligence. In robotics, autonomous grasping in stationary settings has been extensively studied [2], [3], typically using decoupled vision and manipulation sub-systems where the camera does not move with the manipulator. While effective for static tasks, this approach struggles in dynamic scenarios where objects move or become occluded. Real-world interactions, such as handovers, require continuous tracking and adaptive grasping, highlighting the need for more integrated solutions.
EARL: Eye-on-Hand Reinforcement Learner for Dynamic Grasping with Active Pose Estimation
Huang, Baichuan, Yu, Jingjin, Jain, Siddarth
In this paper, we explore the dynamic grasping of moving objects through active pose tracking and reinforcement learning for hand-eye coordination systems. Most existing vision-based robotic grasping methods implicitly assume target objects are stationary or moving predictably. Performing grasping of unpredictably moving objects presents a unique set of challenges. For example, a pre-computed robust grasp can become unreachable or unstable as the target object moves, and motion planning must also be adaptive. In this work, we present a new approach, Eye-on-hAnd Reinforcement Learner (EARL), for enabling coupled Eye-on-Hand (EoH) robotic manipulation systems to perform real-time active pose tracking and dynamic grasping of novel objects without explicit motion prediction. EARL readily addresses many thorny issues in automated hand-eye coordination, including fast-tracking of 6D object pose from vision, learning control policy for a robotic arm to track a moving object while keeping the object in the camera's field of view, and performing dynamic grasping. We demonstrate the effectiveness of our approach in extensive experiments validated on multiple commercial robotic arms in both simulations and complex real-world tasks.