Manipulation
Dexterous Manipulation
Dexterous Manipulation is the control of objects using coordinated multi-contact interaction, typically with multi-fingered hands, including in-hand reorientation, regrasping, and tool use. It requires reasoning over rapidly changing contact modes, friction, and rolling and sliding constraints. OpenAI's 2019 solution of a Rubik's Cube with the Shadow Hand, trained with reinforcement learning and automatic domain randomization, remains a landmark demonstration.
Why it matters for physical AI
Reorienting a part before insertion or manipulating a tool mid-grasp separates genuinely useful manipulation from simple transport. Advances here directly expand the task repertoire of humanoids and dual-arm platforms in unstructured settings.
Build physical AI
Put these concepts to work on real hardware
Axol is a dual-arm robot built for physical AI — teleoperate it, collect demonstrations, and deploy learned policies out of the box.