Join IEEE| IEEE.org| IEEE Xplore Digital Library| IEEE Standards| IEEE Spectrum| More Sites
arrow_back_ios

Robots

Your Guide to the World of Robotics

menu

Gallery

Thumbnail image of Shadow Hand

Shadow Hand

Details

The Shadow Dexterous Hand is one of the most advanced robot hands in the world. It's designed to replicate as much of the functionality, dimensions, and range of motion of the human hand as possible.

Creator
Shadow Robot Company
Country
United Kingdom 🇬🇧
Year
2004
Type
Industrial, Telepresence, Research
Creator
Shadow Robot Company
Country
United Kingdom 🇬🇧
Year
2004
Type
Industrial, Telepresence, Research

Ratings

How do you like this robot?


Rate this robot's appearance

Creepy

Nice


Would you want to have this robot?

 

Did You Know?

Shadow's founder Richard Greenhill says the company began in 1987 as a hobbyist group that'd gather in the attic of his London home. His wife would cook a big pot of spaghetti and the group would work through the night fuelled by copious amounts of tea and coffee.
Shadow's first robot hand was made from scraps of maple wood retrieved from a dumpster of a local kitchen furniture maker.
After Richard Greenhill and his colleagues posted a picture of their robot hand prototype on a website, a university contacted them for a purchase price. They gave a number, and the university said yes.
After trying the tactile telerobot based on the Shadow hand, Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos described it as "weirdly natural" to operate.

Specs

FEATURES
For teleoperation and telepresence applications, the Shadow Hand can be combined with tactile sensors and controlled via a haptic glove for touch-feedback, enabling users to perform manipulation tasks at a remote location without physically being there. Anthropomorphic design mimics size, shape, and degrees of freedom of the human hand. Equipped with position and tactile sensors in the hand.
HEIGHT
44.8 cm | 17.6 in
LENGTH
13.5 cm | 5.3 in
WIDTH
13.5 cm | 5.3 in
WEIGHT
4.3 kg | 9.5 lb
SPEED
N/A km/h | N/A mph

SENSORS
Six-axis gyro and accelerometer, joint angle sensors, force-torque sensors, tactile sensors, current and temperature sensors.
ACTUATORS
20 Maxon motors using PWM. Each motor node implements a PID controller, which can be set to do force control on the tendons at the motor end or position control on the joints.
POWER
48-V 2.5-A power supply
COMPUTING
Multi-core laptop running Ubuntu with EtherCAT compatible network ports.
SOFTWARE
Custom software based on the Robot Operating System (ROS). Software in the host PC provides sensor calibration and scaling, mappings from sensor names to hardware, and easy access to all robot capabilities from Python and C++.
DEGREES OF FREEDOM (DOF)
24 (24 total DoF. 20 actuated DoF. Finger: 3 DoF x 4; Thumb: 5 DoF; Palm: 1 DoF; Wrist: 2 DoF)
MATERIALS
Combination of metals and plastics including aluminium, brass, acetyl, polycarbonate, and polyurethane flesh.
COST
£50000-90000 (depending on configuration)
STATUS
Ongoing
WEBSITE
https://www.shadowrobot.com/products/dexterous-hand/