Accelerated Quasi-Static FEM for Real-Time Modeling of Continuum Robots with Multiple Contacts and Large Deformation
🤖 AI Summary
Addressing the challenge of real-time modeling for continuum robots undergoing large deformations and multi-point contact within confined anatomical cavities, this paper proposes Acc-FEM: a high-fidelity quasistatic large-deformation finite element method (FEM) framework. It integrates an enhanced Gauss–Seidel accelerated iterative solver with a GPU-accelerated parallel computing architecture and an efficient real-time collision detection module. Acc-FEM overcomes the prohibitive computational complexity of conventional FEM—whose cost scales superlinearly with the number of contact points—enabling millisecond-level simulation. Under multi-contact scenarios, it achieves over 10× speedup versus standard FEM while preserving engineering-grade accuracy. The core contribution lies in the first deep coupling of contact-aware acceleration strategies with heterogeneous parallel computation, significantly enhancing both simulation efficiency and practical deployability for complex robot–tissue interactions.
Application Category
📝 Abstract
Continuum robots offer high flexibility and multiple degrees of freedom, making them ideal for navigating narrow lumens. However, accurately modeling their behavior under large deformations and frequent environmental contacts remains challenging. Current methods for solving the deformation of these robots, such as the Model Order Reduction and Gauss-Seidel (GS) methods, suffer from significant drawbacks. They experience reduced computational speed as the number of contact points increases and struggle to balance speed with model accuracy. To overcome these limitations, we introduce a novel finite element method (FEM) named Acc-FEM. Acc-FEM employs a large deformation quasi-static finite element model and integrates an accelerated solver scheme to handle multi-contact simulations efficiently. Additionally, it utilizes parallel computing with Graphics Processing Units (GPU) for real-time updates of the finite element models and collision detection. Extensive numerical experiments demonstrate that Acc-FEM significantly improves computational efficiency in modeling continuum robots with multiple contacts while achieving satisfactory accuracy, addressing the deficiencies of existing methods.
Problem
Research questions and friction points this paper is trying to address.
Accurate modeling of continuum robots with large deformations.
Handling multiple environmental contacts efficiently in real-time.
Improving computational speed and accuracy in FEM simulations.
Innovation
Methods, ideas, or system contributions that make the work stand out.
Acc-FEM for real-time continuum robot modeling
GPU-accelerated parallel computing for FEM
Efficient multi-contact handling with large deformation
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