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Soft machines typically exhibit slow locomotion speed and low manipulation strength because of intrinsic limitations of soft materials. Here, we present a generic design principle that harnesses mechanical instability for a variety of…
Design, implementation, and machine learning issues associated with developing a control system for a serpentine robotic manipulator are explored. The controller developed provides autonomous control of the serpentine robotic…
Brachiation is a dynamic, coordinated swinging maneuver of body and arms used by monkeys and apes to move between branches. As a unique underactuated mode of locomotion, it is interesting to study from a robotics perspective since it can…
Climbing robots hold significant promise for applications such as industrial inspection and maintenance, particularly in hazardous or hard-to-reach environments. This paper describes the quadrupedal climbing robot Magnecko, developed with…
Soft-robot designs are manifold, but only a few are publicly available. Often, these are only briefly described in their publications. This complicates reproduction, and hinders the reproducibility and comparability of research results. If…
We present a new open-source torque-controlled legged robot system, with a low-cost and low-complexity actuator module at its core. It consists of a high-torque brushless DC motor and a low-gear-ratio transmission suitable for impedance and…
Large assemblies of extremely simple robots capable only of basic motion activities (like propelling forward or self-rotating) are often applied to study swarming behavior or implement various phenomena characteristic of active matter…
Snake moves across various terrains by bending its elongated body. Recent studies discovered that snakes can use vertical bending to traverse terrain of large height variation, such as horizontally oriented cylinders, a wedge (Jurestovsky,…
Compliance is a strong requirement for human-robot interactions. Soft-robots provide an opportunity to cover the lack of compliance in conventional actuation mechanisms, however, the control of them is very challenging given their intrinsic…
Biped robots usually adopt feet with a rigid structure that simplifies walking on flat grounds and yet hinders ground adaptation in unstructured environments, thus jeopardizing stability. We recently explored in the SoftFoot the idea of…
We present an open-source untethered quadrupedal soft robot platform for dynamic locomotion (e.g., high-speed running and backflipping). The robot is mostly soft (80 vol.%) while driven by four geared servo motors. The robot's soft body and…
This study presents a powered transtibial prosthesis with complete push-off assistance, RoboANKLE. The design aims to fulfill specific requirements, such as a sufficient range of motion (RoM) while providing the necessary torque for…
Limbless organisms such as snakes can navigate nearly all terrain. In particular, desert-dwelling sidewinder rattlesnakes (Crotalus cerastes) operate effectively on inclined granular media (such as sand dunes) that induce failure in…
Screw-based propulsion systems offer promising capabilities for amphibious mobility, yet face significant challenges in optimizing locomotion across water, granular materials, and transitional environments. This study presents a systematic…
Faced with strong demand for robots working in underwater pipeline environments, a novel underwater multi-model locomotion robot is designed and studied in this research. By mimicking the earthworm's metameric body, the robot is segmented…
This thesis presents a unified modeling and simulation framework for analyzing sidewinding and tumbling locomotion of the COBRA snake robot across rigid, compliant, and granular terrains. A contact-implicit formulation is used to model…
Soft robots are known for their ability to perform tasks with great adaptability, enabled by their distributed, non-uniform stiffness and actuation. Bending is the most fundamental motion for soft robot design, but creating robust, and…
Biomimetic entirely soft robots with animal-like behavior and integrated artificial nervous systems will open up totally new perspectives and applications. However, until now all presented studies on soft robots were limited to partly soft…
Recent advancements in whole-body control through deep reinforcement learning have enabled humanoid robots to achieve remarkable progress in real-world chal lenging locomotion skills. However, existing approaches often struggle with…
Future robots will navigate perilous, remote environments with resilience and autonomy. Researchers have proposed building robots with compliant bodies to enhance robustness, but this approach often sacrifices the autonomous capabilities…