Legged manipulators integrate exceptional terrain adaptability along with mobile manipulation capabilities, which make them highly promising for deployment in human-centric environments. By coordinating the control of both legs and arms, a whole-body controller can significantly expand the operational workspace of legged manipulators. However, many existing whole-body controllers primarily depend on proprioception and do not incorporate the critical exteroception required for effective terrain topology perception. This limitation can hinder their ability to adapt to varying environmental conditions and navigate complex terrains effectively. In this paper, we introduce TA-WBC, a terrain-aware whole-body control framework for legged manipulators, which features a novel RL-based unified policy tailored to whole-body loco-manipulation tasks in various terrains. Specifically, we employ a hybrid exteroception encoder to extract terrain features, providing an essential basis for the robot to proactively adapt posture and footholds. Furthermore, to facilitate stable cross-terrain loco-manipulation, we propose a novel end-effector sampling method based on the foot contact plane, decoupling manipulation target from base fluctuations. Moreover, a dual-policy distillation module is introduced to integrate expansive whole-body motion with terrain adaptability without catastrophic forgetting. The simulation and real-world experiments validate the robustness of our proposed controller, which leads to a larger reachable space, less tracking error, and reduced unexpected stumbles. This unified policy highlights the promising capabilities of legged manipulators in performing loco-manipulation tasks across complex terrains.

翻译：腿式操作器兼具卓越的地形适应性和移动操作能力，使其在人居环境中具有广阔应用前景。通过协调腿部和手臂控制，全身控制器可显著扩展腿式操作器的工作空间。然而，现有全身控制器主要依赖本体感知，缺乏地形拓扑感知所需的关键外部感知能力，这限制了其在多变环境中的适应能力和复杂地形中的导航效率。本文提出TA-WBC——一种面向腿式操作器的地形感知全身控制框架，其核心是基于强化学习的统一策略，专为多地形下的全身移动操作任务设计。具体而言，我们采用混合外部感知编码器提取地形特征，为机器人主动调整姿态和落脚点提供关键依据。此外，为实现稳定的跨地形移动操作，提出基于脚接触平面的末端执行器采样方法，解耦操作目标与机体波动。同时引入双策略蒸馏模块，在无灾难性遗忘的前提下融合全身运动与地形适应性。仿真与实物实验验证了所提控制器的鲁棒性，实现了更大的可达空间、更低的跟踪误差与更少的意外失稳。该统一策略展示了腿式操作器在复杂地形中执行移动操作任务的巨大潜力。