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Actuators
Special Issues
Cutting-Edge Advancements in Robotics and Control Systems
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Cutting-Edge Advancements in Robotics and Control Systems

A special issue of Actuators (ISSN 2076-0825). This special issue belongs to the section "Actuators for Robotics".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: 15 September 2026 | Viewed by 1271

Special Issue Editors

Prof. Dr. Nabih Pico

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Department of Mechanical Engineering, Sungkyunkwan University, Suwon 2066, Republic of Korea
Interests: robotics; autonomous robot navigation; motion planning and control; SLAM; deep learning; deep reinforcement learning
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Dr. Babar Jamil

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
School of Physics, Engineering and Technology, University of York, Heslington, York YO10 5DD, UK
Interests: robotics; soft actuators and sensors; hybrid (soft/rigid) actuators; control
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

The rapid evolution of robotics and control systems is driving unprecedented advancements in automation, intelligence, and adaptability. As robots become increasingly integrated into diverse industries, the demand for innovative methodologies, algorithms, and technologies continues to grow. This Special Issue focuses on cutting-edge advancements in robotics and control systems, highlighting innovative methodologies, algorithms, and technologies that enhance autonomy, adaptability, and efficiency in robotic applications.

By focusing on key areas such as advanced actuation technologies, bio-inspired robotics, advanced motion control strategies, energy-efficient actuation, AI-driven decision-making, human–robot interaction, and autonomous robots, this Special Issue aims to bridge the gap between theoretical advancements and real-world implementations. Bringing together experts from academia and industry, we invite novel contributions that push the frontiers of intelligent automation and real-time control, fostering new possibilities for next-generation robotic systems.

Topics of interest for this Special Issue include, but are not limited to, the following:

  • Actuator technologies;
  • Soft and bio-inspired actuation;
  • Advanced motion control strategies;
  • Energy-efficient actuation;
  • Artificial intelligence in actuation and robot control;
  • Human–robot interaction;
  • Autonomous robots.

Dr. Nabih Pico
Dr. Babar Jamil
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 250 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for assessment.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Actuators is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2400 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • actuators
  • soft and bio-inspired actuation
  • advanced motion control
  • robot control
  • human-robot interaction
  • autonomous robots

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Further information on MDPI's Special Issue policies can be found here.

Published Papers (2 papers)

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Research

21 pages, 10941 KB  
Article
Mechanical Design Methodology for a Biarticularly Driven Biped Robot with Complex Joint Geometry
by Oleksandr Sivak, Krzysztof Mianowski, Steffen Schütz and Karsten Berns
Actuators 2026, 15(3), 145; https://doi.org/10.3390/act15030145 - 3 Mar 2026
Viewed by 397
Abstract
Biarticular actuators can enhance efficiency and stability in legged locomotion by transferring energy between joints. Their effectiveness depends strongly on the lever arm ratio—the ratio of the actuator’s moment arm at one joint to its moment arm at another—which governs how torque is [...] Read more.
Biarticular actuators can enhance efficiency and stability in legged locomotion by transferring energy between joints. Their effectiveness depends strongly on the lever arm ratio—the ratio of the actuator’s moment arm at one joint to its moment arm at another—which governs how torque is distributed across joints during movement. Inspired by biomechanics, early robotic studies implemented biarticular actuators to improve energy efficiency, joint coordination, and positional control, primarily in planar or single-joint systems, leaving a gap in fully 3D robotic legs. Here, we present a geometry optimization framework for a robotic leg incorporating both biarticular and monoarticular actuators. Using human motion capture and joint torque data, we optimized the linkage mechanisms so that the system can maintain the required joint torques while keeping biarticular actuator moment arm ratios near their optimal values during walking and running. The optimized leg achieved a minimum achievable cost of transport of approximately 0.41 J/(kg·m) for walking and 0.62 J/(kg·m) for running. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Cutting-Edge Advancements in Robotics and Control Systems)
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27 pages, 46741 KB  
Article
An Adaptive Enhanced Meta-Transformer for Few-Shot Fault Diagnosis of Unmanned Underwater Vehicle Actuators Under Noisy Conditions
by Yazhou Wang, Jie Liu, Yimin Chen, Rui Tang and Huiyu Wu
Actuators 2026, 15(3), 139; https://doi.org/10.3390/act15030139 - 2 Mar 2026
Viewed by 380
Abstract
Fault diagnosis is crucial for ensuring the navigational safety and reliability of unmanned underwater vehicles (UUVs). However, in complex marine environments, UUV fault samples are typically scarce and often contaminated by severe hydraulic noise, which significantly restricts the performance of existing diagnostic methods. [...] Read more.
Fault diagnosis is crucial for ensuring the navigational safety and reliability of unmanned underwater vehicles (UUVs). However, in complex marine environments, UUV fault samples are typically scarce and often contaminated by severe hydraulic noise, which significantly restricts the performance of existing diagnostic methods. To address these challenges, this paper proposes a few-shot fault diagnosis method based on an Adaptive Enhanced Meta-Transformer. First, operational vibration data from UUV actuators are acquired and preprocessed. Second, a feature enhancement module is constructed using an improved Transformer architecture that incorporates a novel Adaptive Head-Weighted Multi-Head Self-Attention mechanism. This mechanism enables the model to precisely localize key fault segments and enhance directional features, even under noisy backgrounds, effectively mitigating attention dispersion. Subsequently, a meta-optimization strategy is employed to iteratively update model parameters, enabling the model to rapidly adapt to new tasks with limited data. Finally, extensive experiments using real-world operational data from UUV actuators demonstrate that the proposed method outperforms state-of-the-art baselines in terms of accuracy and robustness, particularly in cross-component and noisy scenarios. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Cutting-Edge Advancements in Robotics and Control Systems)
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