US 2,016,059,412 · Filed 2015-08-18

Building Robot Chefs From Snap-Together Movement Blocks

Imagine a humanoid robot that can cook, clean, or help people by combining pre-built movement sequences like LEGO bricks. Instead of programming every tiny gesture from scratch, engineers snap together simple motion libraries—grab, lift, stir—to teach robots complex real-world tasks.

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The plain-English version

What it protects

The claim covers a system and method for creating complex robotic humanoid movements by automatically assembling pre-defined motion primitives called minimanipulations. What's protected here is the ability to combine these elemental movement-and-sensing blocks—each with a specific input command and behavioral outcome—in any serial or parallel configuration to accomplish higher-level tasks like cooking or caregiving. The patent protects both the electronic libraries of these minimanipulation sequences and the programming framework that lets developers build robot behaviors by snapping them together rather than hand-coding every joint angle and sensor reading.

Why it matters

This patent represents a fundamental shift in how humanoid robots are programmed. Rather than requiring specialists to write custom code for every task, the minimanipulation library approach democratizes robot development by letting engineers reuse tested motion blocks across different applications. The concept is commercially valuable because it dramatically speeds up deployment of humanoid robots in service sectors like hospitality, eldercare, and food service—domains where robot adoption has been slow due to high programming costs. By reducing the barrier to teaching robots new tasks, this patent framework makes humanoid automation accessible to smaller companies and institutions.

Real-world use

When a robot in a restaurant kitchen needs to learn how to crack an egg, flip a pan, and plate a dish, engineers would retrieve pre-built minimanipulations from the library and chain them together rather than programming raw motor commands for hours.

Original USPTO abstract

Embodiments of the present disclosure are directed to the technical features relating to the ability of being able to create complex robotic humanoid movements, actions, and interactions with tools and the instrumented environment by automatically building movements for the humanoid; actions and behaviors of the humanoid based on a set of computer-encoded robotic movement and action primitives. The primitives are defined by motions/actions of articulated degrees of freedom that range in complexity from simple to complex, and which can be combined in any form in serial/parallel fashion. These motion-primitives are termed to be minimanipulations and each has a clear time-indexed command input-structure and output behavior/performance profile that is intended to achieve a certain function. Minimanipulations comprise a new way of creating a general programmable-by-example platform for humanoid robots. One or more minimanipulation electronic libraries provide a large suite of higher-level sensing-and-execution sequences that are common building blocks for complex tasks, such as cooking, taking care of the infirm, or other tasks performed by the next generation of humanoid robots.

Patent details

Publication number: US 2,016,059,412
Filing date: 2015-08-18
Grant date: Application — not yet granted
Assignee: Mark Oleynik
Inventor(s): OLEYNIK MARK
CPC class: B25J9/163

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