Pneumatic Muscle-Based Actuator for Industrial Robotic Applications Ján Piteľ 1 , Ondrej Líška 2 and Dagmar Janáčová 3 1 Technical University of Kosice, Faculty of Manufacturing Technologies, Department of Industrial Engineering and Informatics, Bayerova 1, 080 01 Prešov, Slovakia 2 Technical University of Kosice, Faculty of Mechanical Engineering, Department of Automation, Control and Human-Machine Interaction, Letná 9, 042 00 Košice, Slovakia 3 Tomas Bata University in Zlin, Faculty of Applied Informatics, Department of Automation and Control Engineering, Nad Stráněmi 4511, 760 05 Zlín, Czech republic Abstract. The outstanding feature of the pneumatic artificial muscle is its high power to weight ratio vastly outperforming both pneumatic cylinder and DC motor. This feature is very important for using of pneumatic muscle-based actuators in industrial robotic systems where high forces and stiffness of mechanism are often required. The most common so far produced and used type of pneumatic artificial muscle is McKibben muscle and it is now made commercially available by different companies (e.g. Festo). In the paper there are described some of its characteristics and principles of control important for using as actuator for industrial robotic applications. Keywords: industrial robotics, pneumatic actuator; artificial muscle, fuzzy adaptive control 1. Introduction The pneumatic artificial muscles (PAMs) belong to progressive nonconventional actuators powered by compressed air, which is able to perform mechanical work. PAMs can be classified into the groups [1-3], namely:  braided muscles - McKibben muscle, sleeved bladder muscle,  netted muscles - Yarlott muscle, ROMAC, Kukolj muscle,  embedded muscles - Morin muscle, Baldwin muscle, under-pressure muscle, Kleinwachter torsion device, Paynter knitted muscle, Paynter hyperboloid muscle,  pleated muscles - PPAM muscle,  special muscles - rotary muscle, 3-DOF muscle, single-action elastic tube. The type of PAM most frequently used is the McKibben muscle. It is a cylindrical braided muscle and it has tube and sleeving connected at both ends to fittings that not only transfer tensile force but also serves as air closure. The principle of this PAM is described for example in [4-7]. Some important advantages of PAMs for using in industrial robotic applications [8-12]:  extremely high ratio of force and power to weight and volume,  tensile force per unit of muscle cross-sectional can reach up to 300 N/cm2,  can be produced in different sizes and thus in different power ranges,  absent stick-slip effect resulting from the movement of the piston in the pneumatic cylinder,  exact and smooth movement between the limit positions of the muscle working stroke,  ability operate in antagonistic configuration enables to control the stiffness of mechanism,  safe to use in an explosive environment,  Corresponding author.. E-mail address: jan.pitel@tuke.sk. 1218 ISBN 978-981-11-3671-9 Proceedings of 2017 the 7th International Workshop on Computer Science and Engineering (WCSE 2017) Beijing, 25-27 June, 2017, pp. 1218 -1223