--- title: Robotics Fundamentals description: Robotics fundamentals covers the core engineering principles of robot design, kinematics, control systems, and sensing. You will understand how to model robotic motion and program basic autonomous behaviors. category: engineering subcategory: robotics difficulty: beginner, intermediate, advanced url: /subject/robotics-fundamentals --- # Robotics Fundamentals Robotics fundamentals covers the core engineering principles of robot design, kinematics, control systems, and sensing. You will understand how to model robotic motion and program basic autonomous behaviors. ## Available Resources 3 Books • 4 Courses • 5 Websites ## Courses ### 1. Introduction to Robotics (MIT 2.12) **Author:** Harry Asada, John Leonard Covers planar and spatial kinematics, motion planning, manipulator and mobile-robot mechanism design, multi-body dynamics, actuators, sensors and control design. Lecture notes, problem sets, programming assignments, exams and example projects prepare learners to model and control working robotic systems. **Difficulty:** Intermediate | **Price:** Free **Link:** https://ocw.mit.edu/courses/2-12-introduction-to-robotics-fall-2005/ **Tags:** robot-kinematics, robot-dynamics, motion-planning, manipulators, mobile-robots, feedback-control ### 2. Underactuated Robotics (MIT 6.832) **Author:** Russell Tedrake Nonlinear dynamics and control of underactuated systems such as walkers, swimmers and flyers: motion planning, partial feedback linearization, energy shaping, optimal control and reinforcement learning. Includes 23 lecture videos, problem sets with solutions and projects, preparing learners to design controllers that exploit natural dynamics. **Difficulty:** Advanced | **Price:** Free **Link:** https://ocw.mit.edu/courses/6-832-underactuated-robotics-spring-2009/ **Tags:** underactuated-robotics, nonlinear-control, optimal-control, reinforcement-learning, legged-locomotion, motion-planning ### 3. Introduction to Robotics on AWS Short AWS-produced course on running robotics workloads in the cloud, covering industry trends, the shift to cloud-connected robots, common challenges robotics companies face and recommended architecture patterns. Learners understand which AWS services address typical robotics problems and related best practices. **Difficulty:** Beginner | **Language:** English | **Duration:** 1 hour | **Price:** Free **Link:** https://www.coursera.org/learn/aws-introduction-to-robotics-on-aws **Tags:** aws, cloud-robotics, cloud-architecture, robotics-workloads, iot ### 4. Advanced Robotics Learn the core techniques for representing robots that perform physical tasks in the real world. **Difficulty:** Intermediate | **Language:** English | **Price:** Free **Link:** https://www.edx.org/learn/robotics/columbia-university-robotics **Tags:** courses, engineering-manufacturing, robotics ## Websites ### 1. Articulated Robotics **Author:** Josh Newans Josh Newans' written and video tutorials for building a ROS 2 mobile robot end to end: URDF modelling, Gazebo simulation, ros2_control, LIDAR and camera integration, and navigation. Learners finish able to run a complete robot software stack on a Raspberry Pi. **Difficulty:** Intermediate | **Price:** Free **Link:** https://articulatedrobotics.xyz/ **Tags:** ros2, mobile-robots, gazebo, urdf, ros2-control, raspberry-pi ### 2. Robot Academy Free library of short robotics lessons and masterclasses drawn from Peter Corke's university courses, covering coordinate frames, kinematics, dynamics, and vision. Each lesson pairs a video with notes, so topics can be studied individually. **Difficulty:** Beginner | **Price:** Free **Link:** https://robotacademy.net.au/ **Tags:** robotics, kinematics, dynamics, robot-vision, video-lessons ### 3. Peter Corke Robotics Toolbox Open-source MATLAB and Python toolbox implementing kinematics, dynamics, trajectory generation, and manipulator models, with documentation tied to Corke's Robotics, Vision and Control textbook. Lets learners test textbook algorithms on simulated arms. **Difficulty:** Beginner | **Price:** Free **Link:** https://petercorke.com/toolboxes/robotics-toolbox/ **Tags:** robotics, matlab, python, kinematics, simulation ### 4. Modern Robotics Companion site to Lynch and Park's textbook, offering the full PDF, lecture videos, practice problems, and Python code. Builds a screw-theory treatment of configuration space, kinematics, dynamics, and motion planning. **Difficulty:** Beginner | **Language:** English | **Price:** Free **Link:** https://hades.mech.northwestern.edu/index.php/Modern_Robotics **Tags:** robotics, kinematics, motion-planning, screw-theory, textbook ### 5. robotics.org Robotics.org is a comprehensive resource hub for robotics and mechatronics education, featuring tutorials, articles, project ideas, industry news, and a directory of tools, components, and organizations. **Difficulty:** Intermediate | **Language:** English | **Price:** Free **Link:** https://robotics.org **Tags:** websites, engineering-manufacturing, mechanical-engineering ## Books ### 1. Introduction to Robotics: Mechanics and Control **Author:** John J. Craig Standard manipulator textbook working from spatial transformations through forward and inverse kinematics, Jacobians, dynamics, and trajectory generation to linear, nonlinear, and force control. Assumes linear algebra and gives worked derivations rather than intuition alone. **Difficulty:** Intermediate | **Language:** English | **Price:** Paid **Link:** https://www.amazon.com/dp/0201095289?tag=edmonddante07-20 **Tags:** books, engineering-manufacturing, robotics ### 2. Robotics: Modelling, Planning and Control **Author:** Bruno Siciliano, Lorenzo Sciavicco, Luigi Villani, Giuseppe Oriolo Graduate textbook covering rigid-body kinematics, differential kinematics, dynamics, trajectory planning, motion control and force control for robot manipulators, plus mobile robots and visual servoing. Readers finish able to derive and control manipulator models mathematically. **Difficulty:** Intermediate | **Language:** English | **Price:** Paid **Link:** https://www.amazon.com/dp/1846286417?tag=edmonddante07-20 **Tags:** books, engineering-manufacturing, robotics ### 3. Robotics, Vision and Control **Author:** Peter Corke Pairs robotics and computer vision theory with runnable MATLAB toolbox code, covering pose representation, arm and mobile-robot kinematics, image formation, feature extraction and visual servoing. Readers can implement and experiment with each algorithm directly. **Difficulty:** Intermediate | **Language:** English | **Price:** Paid **Link:** https://www.amazon.com/dp/3642201431?tag=edmonddante07-20 **Tags:** books, engineering-manufacturing, robotics --- *This content is part of Dantes.io - Your Treasure Map to Knowledge* *Curated by humans at Dantes.io. Personal study use welcome; republishing this curation requires permission (team@dantes.io).* View this page online: https://dantes.io/subject/robotics-fundamentals