Automated vision-based system for parallel contactless micromanipulation

E. Vela (1) , M. Hafez (2) , Stéphane Régnier (3)

1 Department of Mechanical Engineering, Universidad de Ingeniería y Tecnología
2 DIASI - Département Intelligence Ambiante et Systèmes Interactifs
3 ISIR - Institut des Systèmes Intelligents et de Robotique

This paper presents the automated parallel noncontact manipulation of glass beads ranging from 30 up to 300 μm in size under water. Non-contact micromanipulation is performed by generating controllable laser-induced thermocapillary flows that are capable of dragging the beads. Automated manipulation process is achieved with visual servoing in order to accurately manipulate the beads in a parallel and high-speed manner. Image correlation allowed to detect the bead positions and to provide these positions to a mirror scanner that addressed the IR laser beam at a certain position from the bead. By scanning the laser beam from one bead to another, automated parallel manipulation of beads at speeds in the range of mm·s-1 was demonstrated.

Keywords: Laser beams; Micromanipulators; Robotics; Visual servoing; Laser induced; Micro manipulation; Mirror scanner; Noncontact manipulation; Parallel manipulations; Thermocapillary flow; Vision-based system; Automation; Image correlations

Domains: Engineering Sciences [physics]

E. Vela, M. Hafez, Stéphane Régnier. Automated vision-based system for parallel contactless micromanipulation. 2013 16th International Conference on Advanced Robotics (ICAR), Nov 2013, Montevideo, Uruguay. ⟨10.1109/ICAR.2013.6766530⟩. ⟨cea-01841693⟩