Hardware

Underactuated Gripper

An underactuated gripper is a robotic hand with fewer actuators than mechanical degrees of freedom, whose fingers close through linkages, tendons, or compliant joints that let them passively conform to an object's shape. Designs such as the SDM Hand and Robotiq adaptive grippers achieve robust power grasps of varied objects with a single motor, trading precise fingertip control for mechanical intelligence that tolerates pose uncertainty without sensing.

Why it matters for physical AI

Passive conformity absorbs the perception and control errors that learned grasping systems inevitably make, which is why underactuated designs remain a pragmatic choice for reliable picking in warehouses and unstructured settings.