Patent US 7,076,337

The stability of attitude of a robot can be recovered by an ambulation control apparatus and an ambulation control method if it is lost in the course of a gesture for which the upper limbs take a major role. The apparatus and the method obtain the pattern of movement of the entire body for walking by deriving the pattern of movement of the loins from an arbitrarily selected pattern of movement of the feet, the trajectory of the ZMP, the pattern of movement of the trunk and that of the upper limbs. Therefore, a robot can determine the gait of the lower limbs so as to realize a stable walk regardless if the robot is standing upright or walking. Particularly, if the robot is made to gesture, using the upper body half including the upper limbs and the trunk while standing upright, it can determine the gait of the lower limbs so as to make a stable walk in response to such a gait of the upper body half.