Manipulation of Ungraspable Objects by Environmental Caging

We propose a framework for environmental caging for manipulating objects that cannot be directly grasped by hand. we utilize the environmental contact under gravity to relax the conditions required to achieve the caging manipulation. we search for the equilibrium state of an object for given finger position. We determine if each equilibria can be connected and create a graph network. We search the network and retrieves the finger trajectory from the initial state to the target state. By moving a finger along the retrieved path, we achieve lifting of an object by experiment by using a dual-arm manipulator.