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Suguru Arimoto was born on August 3, 1936 in Hiroshima, Japan. He received the B.S. degree in mathematics from Kyoto University, Kyoto, Japan, in 1959, and the Dr. Eng. degree in control engineering from the University of Tokyo, Tokyo, Japan, in 1967. From 1959 to 1961, he was with Oki Electric Industry Co. Ltd., Tokyo, Japan, as an Engineer in the Electric Computer Department. From 1962 to 1967, he was Research Assistant, and from 1967 to 1968, Lecturer, in the Department of Mathematical Engineering and Information Physics, University of Tokyo. In 1968, he joined the Faculty of Engineering Science, Osaka University, Osaka, Japan, as Associate Professor, and in 1973, he was promoted to Professor of Systems Engineering. In 1988, he was invited to join the University of Tokyo as Professor of the Department of Mathematical Engineering and Information Physics. In 1997, he retired from the University of Tokyo and moved to Ritsumeikan University, Shiga, Japan, where he contributed to the establishment of a new department. Since 1997, he has been a Professor in the Department of Robotics. His research interests are in information theory, control theory, cybernetics, robotics, and machine intelligence. He is IEEE Fellow (1983) and IEICE Fellow (2000), and was awarded the Medal with a Purple Ribbon from the Japanese Government in 2000 and the IEEE 3rd Millennium Medal from the IEEE in 2000.

1959 Apri l– 1962 January
	Oki Electric Industry Co.Ltd.
	Research Engineer in the R & D Department of Electric Computer
1962 February – 1967 March
	The University of Tokyo
	Research Assistant in the Department of Applied Physics, Faculty of Engineering
1967 April – 1968 March
	The University of Tokyo
	Lecturer at the Department of Mathematical Engineering and Information Physics, Faculty of Engineering
1968 April – 1973 February
	Osaka University
	Associate Professor at the Department of Mechanical Engineering, Faculty ofEngineering Science
1973 March – 1990 March
	Osaka University
	Professor at the Department of Mechanical Engineering, Faculty of Engineering Science
1988 April – 1997 March
	The University of Tokyo
	Professor at the Department of Mathematical Engineering and Information Physics, Faculty of Engineering
1997 March 31
	Retired from the University of Tokyo according to the age limit
1997 April -
	Ritsumeikan University
	Professor at the Department of Robotics, Faculty of Science and Engineering
Since 1990 April
	Emeritus Professor of Osaka University
1998 April – 2000 October
	Ritsumeikan University, Director of the Robotics and FA Center
2000 June – 2002 March
	Ritsumeikan University, Director of the VLSI Center
Since 2002 April
	Ritsumeikan University, Director of the Rhome Memorial Hall

1967:	The Yonezawa Promotion Award from the Institute of Electronics, Information and Communications Engineers (IEICE)
1968:	The Best Paper Award from the Society for Instrument and Control Engineers (SICE)
1974:	The Best Paper Award from the IEEE Information Theory Society
1976:	The Best Paper Award from the SICE
1983:	The IEEE Fellowship
1987:	The Best Paper Award from the SICE
1987:	The Sawaragi Memorial Award from the Institute of Systems, Control, and Information Engineers (ISCIE)
1994:	The Best Paper Award from the Robotics Society of Japan (RSJ)
1997:	The Meritorious Award from the Japan Society of Mechanical Engineers (JSME) on the 100th Anniversary of the JSME
1998:	The Meritorious Award from the Robotics & Mechatronics Society of the JSME
2000:	The IEICE Fellowship
2000:	The IEEE Third Millennium Medal
2000:	The Royal Medal with a Purple Ribbon from the Japanese Government
2002:	The Russel Springer Professorship, University of California at Berkeley, California, USA
2003:	The Best Book Publication Award from the SICE
2003:	The Best Paper Award, the Japan-USA Symposium on Flexible Automation
2003:	The RSJ Fellowship
2005:	The Honorary Membership from the Society of Information Theory and Its Applications (SITA)
2006:	The Pioneer in Robotics and Automation Award from the IEEE Robotics and Automation Society(RAS) for "his work on PD and PID control, iterative learning control, and passivity-based control of nonlinear mechanical systems, that represents a source of reference for virtually any scientistsdealing with complex robotic systems."

The Robotics Society of Japan (RSJ)

	1989 – 1991	AdCom Member
	1993 – 1995	Vice President
	1995 – 1997	Presiden

The Society of Instrument and Control Engineers (SICE)

1991 – 1993

AdCom Member

The Institute of Electronics, Information and Communications Engineers (IEICE)

	1989 – 1991	Chairman of the Society for Fundamentals of Electronics, Communications and Computer Sciences
	1999 – 2001	Editor-in-Chief of the IEICE Transactions on Fundamentals

The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE)

	1985 - 1989	Member of the Board of Governors of IT Society
	1988 – 1990	Chairman of the Tokyo Chapter for the Information Theory Society
	1988	Program Chairman of the 1988 IEEE International Symposium on Information Theory
	1990 – 1992	Chairman of the Tokyo Chapter for the Robotics and Automation Society
	1995	Program Chairman of the 1996 IEEE International Symposium on Robotics and Automation

The Institute of Systems, Control, and Information Engineers (ISCIE)

1978 – 1985

AdCom Member

The Society for Information Theory and Its Applications

	1992 – 1993	Vice President
	1994 – 1995	Presiden
	2005	Honorary Member

The Science Council of Japan

	1994 – 1997	Member of the Professional Committee of Mechatronics
	1997 – 2000	Chairman of the Professional Committee of Mechatronics

The Japanese University Accreditation Association

	1999 – 2003	Member of the Accreditation Committee
	2004 - 2005	Member of the Accreditation Committee

1977	M.Y. Gaafar (Professor of Ainsham University, Egypt)
	"Nonlinear control theory," Osaka University
1977	H. Shimizu (Professor of Fukuyama University)
	"Modeling of the total amount of water inflow to Lake Biwa by nonlinear Kalman filtering," Osaka University
1979	T. Minami (Matsuda Automobile Company, Hiroshima)
	"Vibration suppression for automobiles," Osaka University
1980	Y. Monden (Professor of Shimane University)
	"Fast algorithms in signal processing," Osaka University
1981	T. Hashimoto (Professor of the University of Electronics and Communications)
	"Channel coding theorems for convolution coding," Osaka University
1981	T. Inoue (Kobe Steel Company, Kobe)
	"Measurement and prediction of two-phase flow," Osaka University
1981	T. Takegaki (Mitsubishi Electric Industry, Amagasaki)
	"Nonlinear control theory of robot manipulators," Osaka University
1982	F. Miyazaki (Professor of Osaka University)
	"Hierarchical control for biped robots," Osaka University
1983	Y. Tsukamoto (Professor of Kobe University)
	"Numerical methods in inverse problems," Osaka University
1983	H. Morita (Professor of the University of Electronics and Communications)
	"Image data compression based on Shannon's entropy," Osaka University
1984	A. Kikuchi (Professor of the Educational University of Naruto)
	"Design of digital filters," Osaka University
1986	S. Kawamura (Professor of Ritsumeikan University)
	"Iterative learning control," Osaka University
1987	H. Noborio (Professor of Osaka Electro-Communication University)
	"Octrees approach for robot path planning," Osaka University
1987	K. Nagaoka (Associate Professor of the University of Electronics and Communications)
	"Linear stochastic systems theory," Osaka University
1988	H. Suzuki (Professor of Chuo University)
	"Learning through self-organized and tree-structured data base," Osaka University
1988	Shiro Tamaki (Professor of Ryukyu University)
	"Optimal control algorithms for a class of linear discrete time systems," Osaka University
1989	H.G. Lee (KITEC, Korea)
	"Control of flexible robots," Osaka University
1989	T. Masuda (Professor of the Shonan Institute of Technology)
	"Modeling of complex robot dynamics," Osaka University
1989	N. Ishimura (passed away, when he was Associate Professor of the Marine University of Kobe)
	"Ship positioning by simulated rader analysis through marine charts," Osaka University
1991	H. Sugiyama (Professor of the Shonan Institute of Technology)
	"Extension of Shannon's sampling theorem," The University of Tokyo
1992	Y.H. Liu (Professor of the Chinese University of Hong Kong)
	"Algorithmic study on path and motion planning of robots," The University of Tokyo
1993	H. Sato (Professor of Senshu University) H. Sato (Professor of Senshu University)
	"Zero-error problems in information theory," The University of Tokyo
1993	T. Kawabata (Associate Professor of the University of Electronics and Communications)
	"Universal source coding," The University of Tokyo
1994	T. Naniwa (Associate Professor of Fukui University)
	"Coordinated control of dual robot arms," The University of Tokyo
1994	Vicente Parra-Vega (Professor of CINVESTV, Mexico)
	"Adaptive sliding mode control for robot manipulators," The University of Tokyo
1995	H. Koga (Lecturer of Tsukuba University)
	"Source coding with fidelity criterion," The University of Tokyo
1996	H. Kameyama (Glory Industry Co.Ltd., Himeji)
	"Pattern recognition of hand-written letters based on knowledge base," The University of Tokyo
1997	T. Yuasa (Associate Professor of Yamagata University)
	"Image reconstruction for medical CT based on a novel modality," The University of Tokyo
1997	K. Kawada (Glory Industry Co.Ltd., Himeji)
	"Matched filters for pattern recognition," The University of Tokyo
1997	Y. Kawaguchi (Osaka Gass Co.Ltd., Osaka)
	"Development of a climbing robot for detection of failures," The University of Tokyo
1997	S.Y. Yang (Professor of Ulsan University, Ulsan, Korea)
	"Development of stroke detection cylinders for construction machines," The University of Tokyo
1999	H. Ohnishi (Glory Industry Co.Ltd., Himeji)
	"Pattern matching based on detection of rotation and translation by using Hough and Fourier transforms," Ritsumeikan University
2002	Anh Nguyen (Hanoi University of Technology, Hanoi, Vietnam)
	"Dexterous manipulation of objects by single fingers and pairs of fingers with soft-tips," Ritsumeikan University
2003	K. Tahara (Guest Associate Professor of Kyushu University)
	"Sensory feedback for dynamic stable pinching and orientation control of an object by meansof a pair of robot fingers," Ritsumeikan University
2004	J.-H. Bae (Senior Research Scientist of PIRO (Pohang Institute of Intelligent Robotics), Korea)
	"Object manipulation by a pair of robot fingers from the bio-mimetic viewpoint," Ritsumeikan University
2006	H. Hashiguchi (Lecturer of Daido Institute of Technology, Nagoya)
	"A dynamic control method based on stability on a manifold for a family of redundant robotsand under-actuated robots," Ritsumeikan University
2007	M. Yoshida (Research Scientist of BMC Research Center, RIKEN)
	"Modeling and control of 2-D and 3-D object grasping and manipulation under nonholonomic constraints," Ritsumeikan University
2007	M. Sekimoto (Postdoctoral Fellow of Ritsumeikan University)
	"Generation of skilled multi-joint reaching movements under DOF redundancy," Ritsumeikan University

Symposiums and Conferences	Date	Conference Cites	Engagement
Organized Session on Learning Control, at the 23rd IEEE CDC	1984.12	Las Vegas, NV, USA	Invited Lecture “Bettering Operation of Dynamic Systems by Learning”
Yale Workshop on Adaptive and Learning Systems	1986.6	New Haven, Connecticut, USA	Invited Lecture“Mathematical Theory of Learning with Applications to Robot Control”
1988 IEEE Int. Symp. on Information Theory	1988.7	Kobe,Japan	Program Chairman
Japan-USA Symposium on Flexible Automation	1988.7.18- 20	Minneapolis, Minnesota, USA	Program Chairman
ibid.	1992.7.9 - 13	Osaka, Japan	Chairman of the Organizing Committee
Korean Automatic Control Conference	1992.10	Seoul, Korea	Plenary Lecture “Orthogonalization Principle for Hybrid Control of Robot Arm under Geometric Constraint”
IFAC Symp. on Robot Control (SYROCO ’94)	1994.9.19- 21	Capri, Italy	Plenary Lecture “State-of-the-Art and Future Research Directions of Robot Control”
1995 IEEE Int. Conf. On Robotics and Automation	1995.5.21 - 27	Nagoya, Japan	Program Chairman
IFAC Symp. on Motion Control	1995.10.9 - 11	Munich, ermany	Plenary Lecture “Nonlinear Position-dependent Circuits for Mechanical Motion Control”
Japan-USA Symp. on Flexible Automation	1996.7.8 - 10	Boston, MA, USA	Plenary Lecture “Nonlinear Position-dependent Circuits: A Language Expressing Dynamics of Electro-Mechanical Systems
IASTED Int. Conf. on Robotics and Manufacturing	1996.8.19 - 22	Honolulu, Hawaii, USA	Plenary Lecture “Energy-based Expressions of Robot dynamics via Nonlinear Position-Dependent Circuits”
ECPD Int. Conf. of Advanced Robotics, Intelligent Automation, and Active Systems	1996.9.26 - 28	Vienna, Austria	Invited Talk “Intelligent Robot Control on the Basis of Nonlinear Circuit Theory”
ibid.	1997.9.15 - 17	Bremen, Germany	Invited Talk “A Generalization of Impedance Matching for Evaluation of Robot Skill”
Pioneering Int. Symp. on Motion and Vibration Control in Mechatronics	1999.4.6 - 7	Tokyo, Japan	Invited Talk “Analysis of Nonlinear Mechanical Systems via Passivity and Dissipativity”
Int. Workshop on Morpho-functional Machines	2001.3.5 - 7	Tokyo, Japan	Invited Talk “Sensory feedback for secure grasping by a pair of robot fingers with soft tips”
2001 IEEE Int. Conf. on Control Applications	2001.9.5 - 7	Mexico City,Mexico	Invited Talk “Existence of feedbacks from sensing to action for stable grasping and dexterous manipulation by multi-fingered robot hands”
The 8th IEEE Int. Conf. on Methods and Models in Automation and Robotics	2002.9.2 - 5	Szczecin, Poland	Plenary Talk “Can Newtonian mechanics explicate why and how babies (or robots) acquire dexterous hand motion?”
SICE Annual Conf. in Fukui	2003.8.4 - 6	Fukui, Japan	Tutorial Talk “Control for a family of nonlinear and under-actuated systems with DOF-redundancy and geometric constrants”
The 7th IFAC Symp. on Robot Control	2003.9.1 - 3	Wroclaw, Poland	Plenary Talk “Intelligent Control of Multi-fingered Hands”
The 2003 IEEE Int. Conf. on Robotics, Intelligent Systems and Signal Processing	2003.10.8 - 13	Changsha, China	Invited Plenary Talk “Intelligent Control of Multi-fingered Hands”
The Second Conference on Artificial Muscles	2004.5.20-21	Osaka, Japan	Invited Talk “Natural Resolution of Ill-Posedness of Inverse Kinematics for Redundant Multi-joint Movements”
The 2004 Int. Symp. Nonlinear Theory & Its Applications	2004.11.30- 12.	Fukuoka, Japan	Invited Plenary Talk“A Challenge to Bernstein’s Degrees-of-Freedom Problem in Both Cases of Human and Robotic Multi-Joint Movements”

Deputy Editor	1980 - 2005	Robotica
Deputy Editor	1991.4 - 1992.3	SICE Transactions
Associate Editor	2005 -	Robotica
Associate Editor	1980 - 2002	Int. J. of Robotics Research
Associate Editor	1984 -	J. of Robotics Systems
Associate Editor	1996.5 - 1999.4	IEEE Trans. on Robotics and Automation
Associate Editor	1994 -	Autonomous Robots
Associate Editor	1997 -	Int. J. of Intelligent Control and Systems
Associate Editor	1993 -	J. of Intelligent Automation and Soft Computing
Associate Editor	1991 - 2003	J. of Circuits, Systems and Computers
Associate Editor	1996 -	Systems and Control Letters
Associate Editor	1997 -	J. of Chinese Institute of Engineers
Associate Editor	1993 - 2000	Annals of the Institute of Statistical Mathematics
Associate Editor	1973 - 1997	Int. J. of Systems Science
Subject Editor	2004 -	Int. J. Adaptive Control and Signal Processing
Editor-in-Chief	1994.6 - 1996.5	IEICE Trans. on Fundamentals
Editor-in-Chief	1992.4 - 1993.3	SICE Transactions

1 Information Theory

People in the robotics research community are perhaps unfamiliar with the fact that in the beginning of his research career Professor Arimoto was very active in information theory. Here, one should mention the paper [1], where a type of error-correcting code similar to the so-called Reed-Solomon code was established, and an efficient decoding algorithm equivalent to Peterson's algorithm was found. The code is nowadays popular in IT technology. It is implemented in VLSI-chips in compact disks and digital video disks. A summarized paper was published lately in [2]. An efficient algorithm for computing a channel capacity of any type of memoryless channels was proposed in [3]. This algorithm was subsequently discovered also by R. Blahut in the same year, so nowadays it is called the Arimoto-Blahut algorithm. The contribution [3] received the Best Paper Award from the IEEE Information Theory Society. Another paper [4] concerning the strong converse to the coding theorem became fundamental and stimulated the derivation of new proofs of the channel coding theorems. Also related to this direction are the papers [5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10].

Selected Publications

1. Arimoto S (1961) Encoding and decoding of p-nary group codes and the correction systems. Information Processing 2(6):320–325
2. Arimoto S (1962) On a non-binary error-correcting code. Information Processing in Japan 2:22–23
3. Arimoto S (1972) An algorithm for computing the capacity of arbitrary discrete memoryless channels. IEEE Trans. on Information Theory 18(1):14–20
4. Arimoto S (1973) On the converse to the coding theorem for discrete memoryless channels. IEEE Trans. on Information Theory 19(3):357–359
5. Arimoto S (1976) Computation of random coding exponent functions. IEEE Trans. on Information Theory 22(6):665–671
6. Hashimoto T, Arimoto S (1979) Computational moments for sequential decoding of convolutional codes. IEEE Trans. on Information Theory 25(5):584–591
7. Hashimoto T, Arimoto S (1980) Universally optimum block codes and convolutional codes with maximum likelihood decoding. IEEE Trans. on Information Theory 26(3):272–277
8. Hashimoto T, Arimoto S (1980) On the rate-distortion function for the nonstationary gaussian autoregressive process. IEEE Trans. on Information Theory 26(4):478–480
9. Hashimoto T, Arimoto S (1981) A hierarchy of codes for memoryless channels. IEEE Trans. on Information Theory 27(3):348–350
10. Morita H, Arimoto S (1983) SECT—a coding technique for black/white graphics. IEEE Trans. on Information Theory 29(4):559–570

2 Signal Processing

A matrix extension of Rouche's theorem to investigate the location of zeros of polynomial matrices and its application to to multivariate autoregressions was proposed in [1]. A fast algorithm for fitting ARX (m, n) models and determining their orders from the covariance and cross-covariance information of input and output processes was presented in [2]. Compared to the usual Cholesky decomposition method, which requires a number of operations proportional to O[(m+n)4], this algorithm reduces the computational complexity to [O(m+n)2]. Next, a new method for statistical design of approximately linear-phase autoregressive-moving average (ARMA) digital filters was introduced in [3]. The key idea of this method is that a time-delayed ARMA filter is used to approximate a high-order FIR filter that meets the prescribed amplitude spectrum sufficiently well.

Selected Publications

1. Monden Y, Arimoto S (1980) Generalized Rouche's theorem and its application to multivariate autoregressions. IEEE Trans. on Acoustics, Speech, and Signal Processing 28(6):733–738
2. Monden Y, Yamada M, Arimoto S (1982) Fast algorithm for identification of an ARX model and its order determination. IEEE Trans. on Acoustics, Speech, and Signal Processing 30(3):390–399
3. Monden Y, Komatsu T, Arimoto S (1984) Statistical design of nearly linearphase ARMA filters. IEEE Trans. on Acoustics, Speech, and Signal Processing 32(5):1097–1100

3 General Control Theory

In 1964, prior to Potter's publication in 1966, an efficient algorithm for computing the unique positive definite matrix solution for a stationary matrix Riccati equation was established in [1]. The Arimoto-Potter algorithm is based on the spectrum factorization of an extended Hamilton's matrix. By using this algorithm, optimal regulators as well as the Kalman filters, which are a class of linear dynamical systems with gain matrices in the state feedback defined as solutions to Riccati's matrix equations, can be computed [2]. Note that if the states are not accessible, it is normally recommended to use state observers for the state estimation. However, when calculating the optimal gain matrix, the overall quadratic performance index deteriorates owing to the incorporationof the state observer. This problem of performance deterioration was solved completely by the exact evaluation of the deterioration amount for the case the Kalman filter as a state estimator [3] and for the case of a minimum-dimension Luenberger's observer [4].

Selected Publications

1. Arimoto S (1964) An analytical design method for multi-variable control systems. In: Proc. Annual SICE Conf. Volume 1. 207–220
2. Arimoto S (1966) Optimal feedback control minimizing the effects of noise disturbance. Trans. of SICE 2(1):1–7
3. Arimoto S, Porter B (1973) Performance deterioration of optimal regulators incorporating Kalman filters. International Journal of Systems Science 4(2):179–184
4. Arimoto S, Hino H (1975) Performance deterioration of optimal regulators incorporating state estimators. International Journal of Control 19(6):1133–1142

4 Theory of Robot Control

4.1 PD Feedback for Robot Control by Means of Artificial Potentials

This is perhaps the most well-known contribution of Professor S. Arimoto. It was incubated in joint discussions with then Ph.D. student M. Takegaki and Assistant Professor F. Miyazaki. The original idea of both joint-space and task-space PD feedback schemes with damping shaping and gravity compensation first appeared in [1]. The global asymptotic stability for set-point position control by using PD feedback schemes was proved on the basis of Lyapunov's stability analysis. The use of Jacobian transpose associated with the task-space feedback was also initiated in this paper. In early 1980s this was truly a pioneering work in robot control. Nowadays, PD feedback with damping shaping becomes standard and is implemented in many experimental and industrial robotic systems. This control scheme is based upon the idea of introduction of an artificial potential function [2]. The PD feedback scheme was subsequently extended to a PID feedback control without compensating the gravity term [3], which assures asymptotic stability of the target equilibrium state in a local sense. The global asymptotic stability of such a PID feedback scheme for robotic arms was in the sequel established by introducing a saturated position error term, which was called the SP-ID feedback scheme [4]. The robustness of the task-space PD feedback control was formally established in [5, 6, 7].

Selected Publications

1. Takegaki M, Arimoto S (1981) A new feedback method for dynamic control of manipulators. Trans. ASME, Journal of Dynamic Systems, Measurement, and Control 103(2):119–125
2. Miyazaki F, Arimoto S, Takegaki M, Maeda Y (1984) Sensory feedback based on the artificial potential for robot manipulators. Proc. 9th IFAC Congress. Volume 8. 27–32
3. Arimoto S, Miyazaki F (1984) Stability and robustness of PID feedback control for robot manipulators of sensory capability. In Brady M, Paul R, eds.: Robotics Research: First International Symposium. MIT Press 783–799
4. Arimoto S (1995) Fundamental problems of robot control: Part I. Innovations in the realm of robot servo-loops. Robotica 13(1):19–27
5. Cheah C, Hirano M, Kawamura S, Arimoto S (2003) Approximate Jacobian control for robots with uncertain kinematics and dynamics. IEEE Trans. on Robotics and Automation 19(4):692–702
6. Cheah C, Kawamura S, Arimoto S, Lee K (2001) H-∞ tuning for task-space feedback control of robot with uncertain Jacobian matrix. IEEE Trans. on Automatic Control 46(8):1313–1318
7. Cheah C, Hirano M, Kawamura S, Arimoto S (2004) Approximate Jacobian control with task-space damping for robot manipulators. IEEE Trans. on Automatic Control 49(5):752–757

4.2 Passivity-Based Control

It was observed in [1] that not only a conjugate input-output pair composed of the torque control input vector and the joint angular velocity vector satisfies passivity but also a pair of the torque input and a linear sum of a saturated position error vector and the joint angular velocity vector satisfies passivity. This idea played a key role in establishing a new control-theoretic approach called "passivity-based control", which is now admitted to be a very effective tool for the control of nonlinear mechanical systems [2]. A nonlinear positiondependent circuit theory for the mechanical systems was outlined in [3]. The passivity-based approach was applied to the tracking control of robotic arms [4], force control in geometrically constrained manipulations [5, 6], and to the cooperative control of multiple robots carrying a common object [7, 8]. The basic ideas of this approach in the applications to robot control were highlighted in the keynote talk [9] given at a special session, dedicated to the passivity-based control, of the IEEE ICRA 2000 Conference.

Selected Publications

1. Arimoto S (1994) A class of quasi-natural potentials and hyper-stable PID servoloops for nonlinear robotic systems. Trans. of SICE 30(9):1005–1012
2. Arimoto S (1996) Control Theory of Nonlinear Mechanical Systems: A Passivity-Based and Circuit-Theoretic Approach. Oxford University Press, U.K.
3. Arimoto S, Nakayama T (1996) Another language for describing motions of mechatronics systems: a nonlinear position-dependent circuit theory. IEEE/ASME Trans. on Mechatronics 1(2):168–180
4. Parra-Vega V, Arimoto S, Liu YH, Hirzinger G, Akella P (2003) Dynamic sliding PID control for tracking of robot manipulators: theory and experiments. IEEE Trans. on Robotics and Automation 19(6):967–976
5. Whitcomb L, Arimoto S, Naniwa T, Ozaki F (1997) Adaptive model-based hybrid control of geometrically constrained robot arms. IEEE Trans. on Robotics and Automation 13(1):105–116
6. Whitcomb L, Arimoto S, Naniwa T, Ozaki F (1996) Experiments in adaptive model-based force control. IEEE Control Systems Magazine 16(1):49–57
7. Liu YH, Kitagaki K, Ogasawara T, Arimoto S (1999) Model-based adaptive hybrid control for manipulators under multiple geometric constraints. IEEE Trans. on Control Systems Technology 7(1):97–109
8. Liu YH, Arimoto S (1996) Distributively controlling two robots handling an object in the task space without any communication. IEEE Trans. on Automatic Control 41(8):1193–1198
9. Arimoto S (2000) Passivity-based control. Proc. IEEE Int. Conf. on Robotics and Automation, San Francisco, CA 227–232

4.3 Iterative Learning Control

In 1976 a simple but original idea of the effectiveness of learning of robotic motion through repeated exercises was presented by M. Uchiyama, a Professor of Tohoku University. Professor S. Arimoto and his colleagues reformulated this idea into an axiomatic framework of iterative learning control (ILC) [1], which gave rise to a new field of control theory. Initially, the framework was based on a simple and effective sufficient condition for convergence of the iterative control scheme [1, 2]. A more efficient iterative learning control scheme, named P-type ILC, was subsequently proposed in [3]. Later on, a unified approach for not only the ILC but also for the repetitive (or periodic) control was presented in [4, 5]. It is shown there that, as far as linear dynamical systems are concerned, the ability of learning corresponds to the system characteristics such as the output-dissipativity or the strict positive realness with an extra condition. The application of the ILC to the control of geometrically constrained robot arms was outlined in [6].

Selected Publications

1. Arimoto S, Kawamura S, Miyazaki F (1984) Bettering operation of robots by learning. Journal of Robotic Systems 1(2):123–140
2. Kawamura S, Miyazaki F, Arimoto S (1988) Realization of robot motion based on a learning method. IEEE Trans. on Systems, Man and Cybernetics 18(1):126–134
3. Arimoto S (1990) Learning control theory for robotic motion. International Journal of Adaptive Control and Signal Processing 4(6):543–564
4. Arimoto S, Naniwa T (2000) Equivalence relations between learnability, outputdissipativity, and strict positive realness. International Journal of Control 73(10):824–831
5. Arimoto S, Naniwa T (2001) Corrections and further comments to "equivalence relations between learnability, output-dissipativity and strict positive realness". International Journal of Control 74(14):1481–1482
6. Naniwa T, Arimoto S (1995) Learning control for robot tasks under geometric endpoint constraints. IEEE Trans. on Robotics and Automation 11(3):432–441

4.4 Navigation of Autonomous Robot Vehicles

A new data-structure, named tangent graph, that can be effectively used in navigation of autonomous robot vehicles was introduced in [1]. This datastructure is computationally superior to the conventional data-structure based on the visibility graphs because the total number of nodes can be drastically reduced in comparison with the conventional data-structure [2]. The tangent graph data-structure can be implemented in autonomous robotic vehicles equipped with range sensors. Various path planning techniques exploiting this data-structure were proposed in [3, 4].

Selected Publications

1. Liu YH, Arimoto S (1991) Proposal of tangent graph for path planning of mobile robots. Proc. IEEE Int. Conf. on Robotics and Automation, Sacramento, CA 312–317
2. Liu YH, Arimoto S (1992) Path planning using a tangent graph for mobile robots among polygonal and curved obstacles. The International Journal of Robotics Research 11(4):376–382
3. Liu YH, Arimoto S (1994) Computation of the tangent graph of polygonal obstacles by moving-line processing. IEEE Trans. on Robotics and Automation 10(6):823–830
4. Liu YH, Arimoto S (1995) Finding the shortest path of a disc among polygonal obstacles using a radius-independent graph. IEEE Trans. on Robotics and Automation 11(5):682–691

4.5 Dynamic Bipedal Walking

In 1979 the research group at Osaka University, led by Professor S. Arimoto, developed a biped robot, named "Idaten", that could walk stably in a dynamic sense with a regular human walking speed [1, 2]. The development was largely based on the theoretical analysis of the dynamics of the biped walking in the sagittal plane. To stabilize the robot motion, a hierarchical control system based on the singular-perturbation technique was proposed [1]. The use of an early prototype of the iterative learning control scheme also contributed to the success in the experiments.

Selected Publications

1. Miyazaki F, Arimoto S (1980) A control theoretic study on dynamical biped locomotion. Trans. ASME, Journal of Dynamic Systems, Measurement, and Control 102:233–239
2. Arimoto S, Miyazaki F (1984) Biped locomotion robots. Japan Annual Review in Electronics, Computers & Telecommunications 12:194–205

4.6 Intelligent Control of Multi-Fingered Robotic Hands

This research area was in the scope of the scientific interests of Professor S. Arimoto starting from the early paper [1], where the basic modeling was analyzed. The role of the sensory-motor coordination in the control of multi-fingered hands was explored in [2, 3, 4, 5]. In [2, 3] it was shown that rolling contacts produce constraint forces tangent to object surfaces, by which stable pinching in a dynamic sense can be realized. Concepts of the stability on a manifold and the transferability to a submanifold were introduced in [6] and shown to be crucial in dealing with robot dynamics that are are nonlinear, redundant and under-actuated. A single sensory-motor control signal for stable pinching that needs neither parameters of the object kinematics nor the external sensing was established in [7, 8]. This control scheme was extended for the objects with non-parallel surfaces, and it was shown that a blind grasping can be implemented in robotic hands in the same way as humans grasp an object stably when they close eyes [9]. Note that the papers [7, 9, 11] were among the three finalists for the IEEE ICRA Best Manipulation Paper Award in, respectively, 2004, 2005, and 2006. Recently, it was shown that 3D-object grasping and manipulation by two fingers are possible in a blind manner even when the instantaneous axis of object rotation is changeable and yields non-holonomic constraints [10]. In addition, a physically faithful modeling of 3-D object manipulation, taking into account the spinning motion around the opposition axis, was established in [12, 13].

Selected Publications

1. Arimoto S, Miyazaki F, Kawamura S (1987) Cooperative motion control of multiple robot arms or fingers. Proc. IEEE Int. Conf. on Robotics and Automation, Raleigh, North Carolina 1407–1412
2. Arimoto S, Nguyen P, Han HY, Doulgeri Z (2000) Dynamics and control of a set of dual fingers with soft tips. Robotica 18(1):71–80
3. Arimoto S, Tahara K, Yamaguchi M, Nguyen P, Han HY (2001) Principle of superposition for controlling pinch motions by means of robot fingers with soft tips. Robotica 19(1):21–28
4. Arimoto S, Tahara K, Bae JH, Yoshida M (2003) A stability theory on a manifold: concurrent realization of grasp and orientation control of an object by a pair of robot fingers. Robotica 21(2):163–178
5. Arimoto S, Yoshida M, Bae JH, Tahara K (2003) Dynamic force/torque balance of 2D polygonal objects by a pair of rolling contacts and sensory-motor coordination. Journal of Robotic Systems 20(9):517–537
6. Arimoto S (2004) Intelligent control of multi-fingered hands. Annual Review in Control 28(1):75–85
7. Ozawa R, Arimoto S, Yoshida M, Nakamura S (2004) Stable grasping and relative angle control of an object by dual finger robots without object sensing. Proc. IEEE Int. Conf. on Robotics and Automation, New Orleans, USA 1694–1699
8. Ozawa R, Arimoto S, Nakamura S, Bae JH (2005) Control of an object with parallel surfaces by a pair of finger robots without object sensing. IEEE Trans. on Robotics 21(5):965–976
9. Arimoto S, Ozawa R, Yoshida M (2005) Two-dimensional stable blind grasping under the gravity effect. Proc. IEEE Int. Conf. on Robotics and Automation, Barcelona, Spain 1208–1214
10. Arimoto S, Yoshida M, Bae JH (2006) Stable "blind grasping"of a 3D object under non-holonomic constraints. Proc. IEEE Int. Conf. on Robotics and Automation, Orlando, USA 2124–2130
11. Tahara K, Luo ZW, Ozawa R, Bae JH, Arimoto S (2006) Bio-mimetic study on pinching motions of a dual-finger model with synergetic actuation of antagonist muscles. Proc. IEEE Int. Conf. on Robotics and Automation, Orlando, USA 994–999
12. Arimoto S, Yoshida M, Bae JH (2006) Stability of 3-d object grasping under the gravity and non-holonomic constraints. Proc. 17th Int. Symp. on Math. Theory of Networks and Systems, Kyoto, Japan
13. Arimoto S, Yoshida M, Bae JH (2006) Modeling of 3-d object manipulation by multi-joint robot fingers under non-holonomic constraints and stable blind grasping. Proc. Asian Congress of Multi-body Dynamics, Tokyo, Japan

4.7 Human-like Reaching Movements

Dealing with famous Bernstein's problem of the coordination of multiple degrees of freedom in human movements, it was suggested [1] that a typical problem of ill-posedness of the inverse kinematics for redundant robotic systems can be resolved in a natural way without introducing any artificial cost function to determine the inverse or without calculating any pseudo inverse of the Jacobian matrices. It was shown [2] that in the case of redundant multijoint reaching movements a task-space position feedback with a single stiffness parameter together with damping shaping in the joint space can generate human-like skilled reaching motions (the endpoint trajectory is quasi-linear, the velocity profile is bell-shaped and the acceleration signals have double peaks). Based on the mathematical analysis and physiological interpretations of this fact, a Virtual Spring/Damper Hypothesis was introduced in [3, 4]. The hypothesis can successfully compete with various (and sometimes controversial) reasonings proposed in physiology. A mathematical verification of the effectiveness of the Virtual Spring/Damper Hypothesis on the basis of differential geometry is given in [5], and its neurophysiological meaning is discussed in [6].

Selected Publications

1. Arimoto S, Sekimoto M, Hashiguchi H, Ozawa R (2005) Natural resolution of illposedness of inverse kinematics for redundant robots: A challenge to Bernstein's degrees-of-freedom problem. Advanced Robotics 19(4):401–434
2. Arimoto S, Sekimoto M, Hashiguchi H, Ozawa R (2005) Physiologically inspired robot control: A challenge to Bernstein's degrees-of-freedom problem. Proc. IEEE Int. Conf. on Robotics and Automation, Barcelona, Spain 4511–4518
3. Arimoto S, Hashiguchi H, Sekimoto M, Ozawa R (2005) Generation of natural motions for redundant multi-joint systems: A differential-geometric approach based upon the principle of least actions. Journal of Robotic Systems 22(11):583–605
4. Arimoto S, Sekimoto M (2006) Human-like movements of robotic arms with redundant dofs: Virtual spring-damper hypothesis to tackle the Bernstein problem. Proc. IEEE Int. Conf. on Robotics and Automation, Orlando, USA 1860–1866
5. Arimoto S (2006) A differential-geometric approach for Bernstein's degrees-of-freedom problems. Proc. 17th International Symposium on Mathematical Theory of Networks and Systems, Kyoto, Japan
6. Arimoto S (2006) What is a breakthrough toward human robotics? Proc. IEEE/RSJ Int. Conf. on Intelligent Robots and Systems, Beijin, China (an extended version of this paper is to appear in Advanced Robotics, VSP International Science Publishers).