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With the fast and unstoppable evolution of robotics and artificial intelligence, effective autonomous navigation in real-world scenarios has become one of the most pressing challenges in the literature. However, demanding requirements, such…
Inspired by the octopus and other animals living in water, soft robots should naturally lend themselves to underwater operations, as supported by encouraging validations in deep water scenarios. This work deals with equipping soft arms with…
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…
Micro-organisms propel themselves in viscous environments by the periodic, nonreciprocal beating of slender appendages known as flagella. Active materials have been widely exploited to mimic this form of locomotion. However, the realization…
True microrobots, in contrast with externally controlled microparticles, must harvest or carry their own source of energy, as well as their own (preferably programmable) microcontroller of actuators for locomotion, using information…
In the last few years, there have been many new developments and significant accomplishments in the research of bionic robot fishes. However, in terms of swimming performance, existing bionic robot fishes lag far behind fish, prompting…
By leveraging their high mobility and small size, insects have been combined with microcontrollers to build up cyborg insects for various practical applications. Unfortunately, all current cyborg insects rely on implanted electrodes to…
Amphibious legged robots inspired by salamanders are promising in applications in complex amphibious environments. However, despite the significant success of training controllers that achieve diverse locomotion behaviors in conventional…
The success of soft robots in displaying emergent behaviors is tightly linked to the compliant interaction with the environment. However, to exploit such phenomena, proprioceptive sensing methods which do not hinder their softness are…
Sidewinding, a locomotion strategy characterized by the coordination of lateral and vertical body undulations, is frequently observed in rattlesnakes and has been successfully reconstructed by limbless robotic systems for effective movement…
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…
Limbless locomotors, from microscopic worms to macroscopic snakes, traverse complex, heterogeneous natural environments typically using undulatory body wave propagation. Theoretical and robophysical models typically emphasize body…
Autonomous ocean-exploring vehicles have begun to take advantage of onboard sensor measurements of water properties such as salinity and temperature to locate oceanic features in real time. Such targeted sampling strategies enable more…
Living microorganisms have evolved dedicated sensory machinery to detect environmental perturbations, processing these signals through biochemical networks to guide behavior. Replicating such capabilities in synthetic active matter remains…
Biological neurons and their in-silico emulations for neuromorphic artificial intelligence (AI) use extraordinarily energy-efficient mechanisms, such as spike-based communication and local synaptic plasticity. It remains unclear whether…
The pursuit of agile and efficient underwater robots, especially bio-mimetic robotic fish, has been impeded by challenges in creating motion controllers that are able to fully exploit their hydrodynamic capabilities. This paper addresses…
Bionic underwater robots have demonstrated their superiority in many applications. Yet, training their intelligence for a variety of tasks that mimic the behavior of underwater creatures poses a number of challenges in practice, mainly due…
Many microorganisms swim by performing larger non-reciprocal shape deformations that are initiated locally by molecular motors. However, it remains unclear how decentralized shape control determines the movement of the entire organism.…
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,…
In nature, a variety of limbless locomotion patterns flourish from the small or basic life form (Escherichia coli, the amoeba, etc.) to the large or intelligent creatures (e.g., slugs, starfishes, earthworms, octopuses, jellyfishes, and…