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Miniature underwater robots play a crucial role in the exploration and development of marine resources, particularly in confined spaces and high-pressure deep-sea environments. This study presents the design, optimization, and performance…
This paper presents design and control innovations of wearable robots that tackle two barriers to widespread adoption of powered exoskeletons, namely restriction of human movement and versatile control of wearable co-robot systems. First,…
Vine robots are a class of soft continuum robots that grow via tip eversion, allowing them to move their tip without relying on reaction forces from the environment. Constructed from compliant materials such as fabric and thin, flexible…
Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI)-guided robotic systems offer great potential for new minimally invasive medical tools, including MRI-powered miniature robots. By re-purposing the imaging hardware of an MRI scanner, the magnetic miniature…
A self-oscillating magnetometer based on the nonlinear magneto-optical rotation effect with separate modulated pump and unmodulated probe beams is demonstrated. This device possesses a bandwidth exceeding $1\khz$. Pump and probe are…
We present a fully edible pneumatic actuator based on gelatin-glycerol composite. The actuator is monolithic, fabricated via a molding process, and measures 90 mm in length, 20 mm in width, and 17 mm in thickness. Thanks to the composite…
Combining off-the-shelf components with 3D-printing, the Wheelbot is a symmetric reaction wheel unicycle that can jump onto its wheels from any initial position. With non-holonomic and under-actuated dynamics, as well as two coupled…
Wireless mouse rings offer subtle, reliable pointing interactions for wearable computing platforms. However, the small battery below 27 mAh in the miniature rings restricts the ring's continuous lifespan to just 1-10 hours, because current…
The precise and continuous tracking of millimetric-sized walkers --such as ants-- is quite important in behavioral studies. However, due to technical limitations, most studies concentrate on trajectories within arenas no more than 100 times…
A wide range of microorganisms, e.g. bacteria, propel themselves by rotation of soft helical tails, also known as flagella. Due to the small size of these organisms, viscous forces overwhelm inertial effects and the flow is at low Reynolds…
The effect of air viscosity on the flow around an insect wing increases as insect size decreases. For the smallest insects (wing length R below 1 mm), the viscous effect is so large that lift-generation mechanisms used by their larger…
Flexible robots have advantages over rigid robots in their ability to conform physically to their environment and to form a wide variety of shapes. Sensing the force applied by or to flexible robots is useful for both navigation and…
Design of robots at the small scale is a trial-and-error based process, which is costly and time-consuming. There are no good dynamic simulation tools to predict the motion or performance of a microrobot as it moves against a substrate. At…
Legged machines are becoming increasingly agile and adaptive but they have so far lacked the morphological diversity of legged animals, which have been rearranged and reshaped to fill millions of niches. Unlike their biological…
Soft robotics has emerged as a promising technology that holds great potential for various application areas. This is due to soft materials unique properties, including flexibility, safety, and shock absorption, among others. Despite many…
This paper presents a novel design and experimental investigation for a self-propelled capsule robot that can be used for painless colonoscopy during a retrograde progression from the patient's rectum. The steerable robot is driven forward…
We present the AgriCruiser, an open-source over-the-row agricultural robot developed for low-cost deployment and rapid adaptation across diverse crops and row layouts. The chassis provides an adjustable track width of 1.42 m to 1.57 m,…
State estimation and control is a well-studied problem in conventional aerial vehicles such as multi-rotors. But multi-rotors, while versatile, are not suitable for all applications. Due to turbulent airflow from ground effects,…
Bristle-bots are legged robots that can be easily made out of a toothbrush head and a small vibrating engine. Despite their simple appearance, the mechanism enabling them to propel themselves by exploiting friction with the substrate is far…
While most insect-inspired robots come with a simple tarsus such as a hemispherical foot tip, insect legs have complex tarsal structures and claws, which enable them to walk on complex terrain. Their sharp claws can smoothly attach and…