The Shadow Dexterous Hand Extra Lite (DHEL) is a three-digit robotic hand built for grasp research, tactile-sensing experiments, and repeatable laboratory evaluation. It uses a two-finger-plus-thumb arrangement that reduces size, weight, and mechanical complexity compared with full five-finger anthropomorphic hands, while still supporting a range of grasp families — stable pinch grips, tripod-style grasps, and power grasps over common lab objects such as cylinders, boxes, tools, and household items. This geometry is a deliberate trade-off, offering multiple grasp strategies with fewer joints, tendons, and control channels than a five-finger design. Tendon-driven actuation, described in published summaries as 10 DC motors driving 12 joints, keeps motor mass away from the fingertips while still producing useful fingertip forces and compliant contact.

The DHEL is aimed at laboratories that need a dependable platform for contact-rich manipulation work — grasp planning and stability metrics, slip detection, in-hand adjustment within its kinematic limits, and both model-based and learning-based control such as imitation and reinforcement learning. Its sensing package, summarized as three tactile sensors, a fingertip force/torque sensing capability, and an IMU, supports gentle grasping and learning from demonstration. With EtherCAT communication and ROS support, the hand integrates as an end-effector on a robotic arm or test rig and slots into widely used academic and industrial robotics stacks for perception, motion planning, and data logging. Formal datasheets and quotations remain the authoritative source for final procurement specifications.