PUB - Publikationen an der Universität Bielefeld

This work presents a novel approach towards achieving highly realistic simulations of tactile sensors using MuJoCo in conjunction with hydroelastic contact surfaces, which replace standard point contacts. Hydroelastic contact surfaces compute a continuous pressure field on an extended contact surface, which allows us to implement tactile sensors with exceptional realism in the simulated environment. The extensions are implemented within a plugin framework, which we also used to realize ROS-control integration within MuJoCo, thus facilitating seamless transfer of robot control algorithms between simulation and real-world setups. Our experimental results demonstrate a remarkable resemblance between the sensor values obtained in the simulation and the data acquired from the physical sensors. Our approach's successful validation further substantiates our sensor simulation's efficacy in facilitating reliable sim-to-real transfer.