Special Issue on Robotic Technologies Towards Industrial Applications

Robotics technologies have come to be widely developed for and applied to a variety of industrial areas, including the manufacturing, transportation, and public security fields. Broadly defined, the robotics technologies implemented in industry involve numerous flexible mechanisms, high-precision control, multi-sensor integration and fusion, high-performance computation, and intelligent software. The collection of articles featured in this special issue concerns several of the robotics technologies touched upon above, such as the mechanical design methodology and applications of manipulators in joint compliance research, the reliability design and implementation of robots utilized to feed glassmaking-materials in the glass industry, and the sensing techniques and navigation algorithm design in multi-floor structural environments, to mention just a few. These papers include too many subjects to all be mentioned here, and have presented exemplifications and applicable approaches to both conventional and cutting-edge industry. They have also greatly enhanced the research and development of robotic technologies. We would like to express our sincere appreciation to the authors, the reviewers, and the editors for their invaluable contributions in making this issue possible.