Related papers: Hybrid aerial ground locomotion with a single pass…
Hybrid ground and aerial vehicles can possess distinct advantages over ground-only or flight-only designs in terms of energy savings and increased mobility. In this work we outline our unified framework for controls, planning, and autonomy…
The use of Micro Aerial Vehicles (MAVs) for inspection and surveillance missions has proved to be extremely useful, however, their usability is negatively impacted by the large power requirements and the limited operating time. This work…
Inspired by the behavior of birds, we present AirCrab, a hybrid aerial ground manipulator (HAGM) with a single active wheel and a 3-degree of freedom (3-DoF) manipulator. AirCrab leverages a single point of contact with the ground to reduce…
This paper presents Duawlfin, a drone with unified actuation for wheeled locomotion and flight operation that achieves efficient, bidirectional ground mobility. Unlike existing hybrid designs, Duawlfin eliminates the need for additional…
In this work, we present Tilt-Ropter, a novel hybrid aerial-terrestrial vehicle (HATV) that combines tilt rotors with passive wheels to achieve energy-efficient multi-mode locomotion. Unlike existing under-actuated HATVs, the fully actuated…
Hybrid locomotion, which combines multiple modalities of locomotion within a single robot, enables robots to carry out complex tasks in diverse environments. This paper presents a novel method for planning multi-modal locomotion…
Cooperating small-scale Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) will open up new application fields within next-generation Intelligent Transportation Sytems (ITSs), e.g., airborne near field delivery. In order to allow the exploitation of the…
Due to its mobility and agility, unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) has emerged as a promising technology for various tasks, such as sensing, inspection and delivery. However, a typical UAV has limited energy storage and cannot fly a long…
Hybrid aerial--ground robots offer both traversability and endurance, but stair-like discontinuities create a trade-off: wheels alone often stall at edges, while flight is energy-hungry for small height gains. We propose an energy-aware…
Humanoids are versatile robotic platforms owing to their limbs with multiple degrees of freedom. Although humanoids can walk like humans, they are relatively slow, and cannot run over large barriers. To address these limitations, we aim to…
We study the problem of covering an environment using an Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) with limited battery capacity. We consider a scenario where the UAV can land on an Unmanned Ground Vehicle (UGV) and recharge the onboard battery. The…
The exploration of the lunar poles and the collection of samples from the martian surface are characterized by shorter time windows demanding increased autonomy and speeds. Autonomous mobile robots must intrinsically cope with a wider range…
Hybrid unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) integrate the efficient forward flight of fixed-wing and vertical takeoff and landing (VTOL) capabilities of multicopter UAVs. This paper presents the modeling, control and simulation of a new type of…
Unmanned aerial vehicles have been demonstrated successfully in a variety of tasks, including surveying and sampling tasks over large areas. These vehicles can take many forms. Quadrotors' agility and ability to hover makes them well suited…
Single locomotion robots often struggle to adapt in highly variable or uncertain environments, especially in emergencies. In this paper, a multi-modal deformable robot is introduced that can both fly and drive. Compatibility issues with…
We present the dynamic model and control of DoubleBee, a novel hybrid aerial-ground vehicle consisting of two propellers mounted on tilting servo motors and two motor-driven wheels. DoubleBee exploits the high energy efficiency of a…
The Roller-Quadrotor is a novel quadrotor that combines the maneuverability of aerial drones with the endurance of ground vehicles. This work focuses on the design, modeling, and experimental validation of the Roller-Quadrotor. Flight…
With the recent developments in the unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV), it is expected them to interact and collaborate with their surrounding objects, other robots and people in order to wisely plan and execute particular tasks. Although these…
Exploring and inspecting \emph{Hidden Spaces}, defined as environments whose entrances are accessible only to aerial robots but remain unexplored due to geometric constraints, limited flight time, and communication loss, remains a major…
Designing ground-aerial robots is challenging due to the increased actuation requirements which can lead to added weight and reduced locomotion efficiency. Morphobots mitigate this by combining actuators into multi-functional groups and…