Related papers: SLUGBOT, an Aplysia-inspired Robotic Grasper for S…
Multi-legged mobile robots possess high mobility performance in rough terrain environments, stemming from their high postural stability, joint flexibility, and the redundancy provided by multiple legs. In prior research on navigating…
A terrestrial robot that can maneuver rough terrain and scout places is very useful in mapping out unknown areas. It can also be used explore dangerous areas in place of humans. A terrestrial robot modeled after a scorpion will be able to…
Aerial robots have garnered significant attention due to their potential applications in various industries, such as inspection, search and rescue, and drone delivery. Successful missions often depend on the ability of these robots to grasp…
Inspired by the vertebrate branch of the animal kingdom, articulated soft robots are robotic systems embedding elastic elements into a classic rigid (skeleton-like) structure. Leveraging on their bodies elasticity, soft robots promise to…
The backswimmer fly is an aquatic insect, capable of regulating its buoyancy underwater. Its abdomen is covered with hemoglobin cells, used to bind and release oxygen, reversibly. Upon entering water, the fly entraps an air bubble in a…
Limbless terrestrial animals exhibit exceptional locomotor versatility and control, currently unmatched by engineered counterparts. Here, we introduce a computational framework that enables soft synthetic snakes to navigate unstructured,…
This paper presents a soft robot finger capable of adaptive-twist deformation to grasp objects by wrapping them. For a soft hand to grasp and pick-up one object from densely contained multiple objects, a soft finger requires the…
Robotic grasping and manipulation in underwater environments present unique challenges for robotic hands traditionally used on land. These challenges stem from dynamic water conditions, a wide range of object properties from soft to stiff,…
Reconfigurable robot swarms are capable of connecting with each other to form complex structures. Current mechanical or magnetic connection mechanisms can be complicated to manufacture, consume high power, have a limited load-bearing…
Robot manipulation in cluttered scenes often requires contact-rich interactions with objects. It can be more economical to interact via non-prehensile actions, for example, push through other objects to get to the desired grasp pose,…
Humans and animals developed a sophisticated motor control apparatus and there is much evidence that it has a modular structure. The modularity offers a range of benefits, e.g. ability to learn dissociable motion styles without interference…
Soft robots have drawn significant attention recently for their ability to achieve rich shapes when interacting with complex environments. However, their elasticity and flexibility compared to rigid robots also pose significant challenges…
Achieving both agile maneuverability and high energy efficiency in aerial robots, particularly in dynamic wind environments, remains challenging. Conventional thruster-powered systems offer agility but suffer from high energy consumption,…
Humanoid robots are machines built with an anthropomorphic shape. Despite decades of research into the subject, it is still challenging to tackle the robot locomotion problem from an algorithmic point of view. For example, these machines…
Imagine a robot controller with the ability to adapt like human synapses, dynamically rewiring itself to overcome unforeseen challenges in real time. This paper proposes a novel zero-shot adaptation mechanism for evolutionary robotics,…
Equipping robotic systems with the capacity to generate $\textit{ex novo}$ hardware during operation extends control of physical adaptability. Unlike modular systems that rely on discrete component integration pre- or post-deployment, we…
Rectilinear crawling locomotion is a primitive and common mode of locomotion in slender, soft-bodied animals. It requires coordinated contractions that propagate along a body that interacts frictionally with its environment. We propose a…
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…
This paper aims to improve robots' versatility and adaptability by allowing them to use a large variety of end-effector tools and quickly adapt to new tools. We propose AdaGrasp, a method to learn a single grasping policy that generalizes…
The predictive functions that permit humans to infer their body state by sensorimotor integration are critical to perform safe interaction in complex environments. These functions are adaptive and robust to non-linear actuators and noisy…