A Ring Network Protocol for Articulated Robots

Articulated robots such as the humanoid robot often have multiple joints implemented in its limbs. It is common for sensor and controller cables to be routed inside of the limb, impacting mobility. A network protocol with high efficiency, low latency, fault tolerance is needed to facilitate communication of sensor and controller data over a more compact communications channel. In this paper, we propose a ring network protocol with fault tolerance in low latency, high efficiency communication over a compact channel. The performance of the proposed network protocol was verified in simulation and experiment, showing that low latency, high efficiency, and fault tolerance can be achieved over a single communications channel.