Engine Agnostic Graph Environments for Robotics (EAGERx): A Graph-Based Framework for Sim2real Robot Learning

Sim2real, that is, the transfer of learned control policies from simulation to the real world, is an area of growing interest in robotics because of its potential to efficiently handle complex tasks. The sim2real approach faces challenges because of mismatches between simulation and reality. These d...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:IEEE robotics & automation magazine 2024-08, p.2-15
Main Authors: van der Heijden, Bas, Luijkx, Jelle, Ferranti, Laura, Kober, Jens, Babuska, Robert
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Codes
Delays
Engines
Physics
Robot learning
Robot sensing systems
Robots
Online Access:Get full text
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Summary:Sim2real, that is, the transfer of learned control policies from simulation to the real world, is an area of growing interest in robotics because of its potential to efficiently handle complex tasks. The sim2real approach faces challenges because of mismatches between simulation and reality. These discrepancies arise from inaccuracies in modeling physical phenomena and asynchronous control, among other factors. To this end, we introduce Engine Agnostic Graph Environments for Robotics (EAGERx), a framework with a unified software pipeline for both real and simulated robot learning. It can support various simulators and aids in integrating state, action, and time-scale abstractions to facilitate learning. EAGERx's integrated delay simulation, domain randomization features, and proposed synchronization algorithm contribute to narrowing the sim2real gap. We demonstrate (in the context of robot learning and beyond) the efficacy of EAGERx in accommodating diverse robotic systems and maintaining consistent simulation behavior. EAGERx is open source, and its code is available at https://eagerx.readthedocs.io.
ISSN:1070-9932
1558-223X
DOI:10.1109/MRA.2024.3433172