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Kin-Huat Low
Visiting Scientist

No longer a member of RI.

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I am interested in a variety of research topics involving kinematics and dynamics. Thanks to my postgraduate works on the large plastics deformation and the dynamics modeling of flexible robot manipulators, I had the chance to pick up the knowledge and appreciate the dynamics of both rigid and flexible bodies. The cross-disciplinary background had also benefited me in my research on structural dynamics and vibrations, beyond the robotics world.

After focusing mostly on the dynamics formulation schemes and modeling methods of the robotics in my post-graduate and post-doctoral-fellow life, I spent several years in the modal analysis and vibration testing of beams and plates. I have also been studying various numerical schemes for nonlinear dynamic and vibratory systems. I am particularly interested in the frequency analysis and solution schemes for a beam carrying multiple masses.

My sabbatical leave in 1996 with the SDRC (Cincinnati, USA), University of Waterloo (Waterloo, Canada), and Spectrum Dynamics (San Jose, USA) had indeed been a very fruitful experience. I had a chance to write commercial codes for impact analysis with I-DEAS; I first learnt to solve engineering problems numerically and symbolically, by using Maple; I also understand the vibration testing and modal analysis in both the software and hardware aspects.

In the recent years, some of my research students have been working on mobile robots, including those with legs and wheels. Our team members have designed and constructed several mobile robots for useful research platforms. Another group of my students are working on haptic devices, and to investigate the relationship between the master and slave hands.

For recent collaborative works, I have worked with the DSO (Defense Science Organisation, Singapore) in the development of a lower exoskeleton system. I have also performed the drop-impact analysis and testing of various electronic products for Philips Co. Starting from a year ago, I have worked with the SIMTech on the design of micro-compliant mechanisms.

In the present short-term attachment to the Robotics Institute at the CMU, I have been able to understand and appreciate the works by Professor Matthew Mason and those by members of the Manipulation Laboratory and the Center for the Foundations of Robotics (CFR). Their geometrical and mathematics models have enriched my insight of robotics manipulation, grasping, motion planning, and non-holonomic constraints. Matthew and I have had several discussion sessions, and we are in a process to study and design a model of pushing robots for moving object without grasping.

haptics, legged locomotion, manipulation, mechanisms, mechatronics, mobile robots, and motion planning