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Soft robots are notoriously hard to control. This is partly due to the scarcity of models able to capture their complex continuum mechanics, resulting in a lack of control methodologies that take full advantage of body compliance. Currently…

Synthetic active collectives, composed of many nonliving individuals capable of cooperative changes in group shape and dynamics, hold promise for practical applications and for the elucidation of guiding principles of natural collectives.…

Robots deployed in unstructured environments must coordinate whole-body motion -- simultaneously moving a mobile base and arm -- to interact with the physical world. This coupled mobility and dexterity yields a state space that grows…

Artificial swarm systems have been extensively studied and used in computer science, robotics, engineering and other technological fields, primarily as a platform for implementing robust distributed systems to achieve pre-defined…

Limbless creatures can crawl on flat surfaces by deforming their bodies and interacting with asperities on the ground, offering a biological blueprint for designing efficient limbless robots. Inspired by this natural locomotion, we present…

Collections of simple, self-propelled colloidal particles exhibit complex, emergent dynamical behavior, with promising applications in microrobotics. When confined within a deformable vesicle, self-propelled rods cluster and align,…

Self-organized aggregation is a well studied behavior in swarm robotics as it is the pre-condition for the development of more advanced group-level responses. In this paper, we investigate the design of decentralized algorithms for a swarm…

Robot arms with lighter weight can reduce unnecessary energy consumption which is desirable in robotic industry. However, lightweight arms undergo undesirable elastic deformation. In this paper, the planar motion of a lightweight flexible…

Soft robots are distinguished by their flexibility and adaptability, allowing them to perform nearly impossible tasks for rigid robots. However, controlling their behavior is challenging due to their nonlinear material response and infinite…

Despite significant research, robotic swarms have yet to be useful in solving real-world problems, largely due to the difficulty of creating and controlling swarming behaviors in multi-agent systems. Traditional top-down approaches in which…

Adaptive morphogenetic robots adapt their morphology and control policies to meet changing tasks and environmental conditions. Many such systems leverage soft components, which enable shape morphing but also introduce simulation and control…

Conventional tracking solutions are not feasible in handling abrupt motion as they are based on smooth motion assumption or an accurate motion model. Abrupt motion is not subject to motion continuity and smoothness. To assuage this, we deem…

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…

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…

The deformable and continuum nature of soft robots promises versatility and adaptability. However, control of modular, multi-limbed soft robots for terrestrial locomotion is challenging due to the complex robot structure, actuator mechanics…

Testing aerial robots in tasks such as pickup-and-delivery and surveillance significantly benefits from high energy efficiency and scalability of the deployed robotic system. This paper presents MochiSwarm, an open-source testbed of…

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…

Adapting upper-limb impedance (i.e., stiffness, damping, inertia) is essential for humans interacting with dynamic environments for executing grasping or manipulation tasks. On the other hand, control methods designed for state-of-the-art…

Soft Robots distinguish themselves from traditional robots by embracing flexible kinematics. Because of their recent emergence, there exist numerous uncharted territories, including novel actuators, manufacturing processes, and advanced…

Soft robots require directional control to navigate complex terrains. However, achieving such control often requires multiple actuators, which increases mechanical complexity, complicates control systems, and raises energy consumption.…