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Modular robotics holds immense potential for space exploration, where reliability, repairability, and reusability are critical for cost-effective missions. Coordination between heterogeneous units is paramount for precision tasks -- whether…
This paper deals with the design of time-invariant memoryless control policies for robots that move in a finite two- dimensional lattice and are tasked with persistent surveillance of an area in which there are forbidden regions. We model…
Magnetic soft robots embedded with hard magnetic particles enable untethered actuation via external magnetic fields, offering remote, rapid, and precise control, which is highly promising for biomedical applications. However, designing such…
Isoperimetric robots are large scale, untethered inflatable robots that can undergo large shape changes, but have only been demonstrated in one 3D shape -- an octahedron. These robots consist of independent triangles that can change shape…
Safety concerns during the operation of legged robots must be addressed to enable their widespread use. Machine learning-based control methods that use model-based constraints provide promising means to improve robot safety. This study…
This paper explores the concept of external magnetic control for vine robots to enable their high curvature steering and navigation for use in endoluminal applications. Vine robots, inspired by natural growth and locomotion strategies,…
Control strategies for robotic needle steering in soft tissues must account for complex interactions between the needle and the tissue to achieve accurate needle tip positioning. Recent findings show faster robotic command rate can improve…
Although strain-based models have been widely adopted in robotics, no comparison beyond the uniform bending test is commonly recognized to assess their performance. In addition, the increasing effort in prototyping continuum robots…
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…
Developing soft robots that can control their own life-cycle and degrade on-demand while maintaining hyper-elasticity is a significant research challenge. On-demand degradable soft robots, which conserve their original functionality during…
This paper introduces the Omnidirectional Tractable Three Module Robot for traversing inside complex pipe networks. The robot consists of three omnidirectional modules fixed 120{\deg} apart circumferentially which can rotate about their…
Robotic materials are multi-robot systems formulated to leverage the low-order computation and actuation of the constituents to manipulate the high-order behavior of the entire material. We study the behaviors of ensembles composed of smart…
Small-scale robots hold great potential for targeted cargo delivery in minimally-inv asive medicine. However, current robots often face challenges to locomote efficiently on slip pery biological tissue surfaces, especially when loaded with…
PURPOSE OF REVIEW: Robot-assisted laparoscopic surgery in urology has gained immense popularity with the daVinci system, but a lot of research teams are working on new robots. The purpose of this study is to review current urologic robots…
Stable dynamical systems are a flexible tool to plan robotic motions in real-time. In the robotic literature, dynamical system motions are typically planned without considering possible limitations in the robot's workspace. This work…
In adult laparoscopy, robot-aided surgery is a reality in thousands of operating rooms worldwide, owing to the increased dexterity provided by the robotic tools. Many robots and robot control techniques have been developed to aid in more…
Vision foundation models trained on massive amounts of visual data have shown unprecedented reasoning and planning skills in open-world settings. A key challenge in applying them to robotic tasks is the modality gap between visual data and…
This paper presents the design concept, modeling and motion planning solution for the aerial robotic chain. This design represents a configurable robotic system of systems, consisting of multi-linked micro aerial vehicles that…
This paper presents a novel multi-axis force-sensing approach in robotic minimally invasive surgery with no modification to the surgical instrument. Thus, it is adaptable to different surgical instruments. A novel 6-axis optical force…
Quasiparticles in liquid crystals, such as torons and skyrmions, represent a new class of topologically protected solitonic excitations, offering a promising route toward soft microrobotics. Here we demonstrate that torons can be propelled…