Soft / Compliant / Deformable Objects

[ndehio]

We would like to simulate contacts with soft / compliant / deformable objects.

[ndehio]

This paper seems to be a good starting point:
"Softbody Simulation in Gazebo for Satellite Servicing"
https://www.google.de/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=1&ved=0ahUKEwjg3dqFo_jQAhUEOxQKHRcsCiAQFggdMAA&url=http%3A%2F%2Flcsr.jhu.edu%2Fwp-content%2Fuploads%2Fsites%2F48%2F2016%2F09%2FHudson-Thomas-softbody-simulation-gazebo-final.pdf&usg=AFQjCNFWFsO4OkcABEYUG4y9WpeAsXs-rA&cad=rja

The authors state:
"We chose to use the Bullet physics engine because it can simulate deformable objects. However, while Gazebo supports Bullet , it does not yet support Bullet's soft body libraries specifically. Gazebo does, however, support third party plugins that allow for hard coded customization. We used these plugins to add Bullet soft body functionality to Gazebo."
and
"The entire project as well as these changes to Gazebo will be made public in our Git repository."