Related papers: Robust Embodied Self-Identification of Morphology …
Fast and modular modeling of multi-legged robots (MLRs) is essential for resilient control, particularly under significant morphological changes caused by mechanical damage. Conventional fixed-structure models, often developed with…
Multi-legged robots deployed in complex missions are susceptible to physical damage in their legs, impairing task performance and potentially compromising mission success. This letter presents a rapid, training-free damage recovery…
Operations in hazardous environments put humans, animals, and machines at high risk for physically damaging consequences. In contrast to humans and animals, quadruped robots cannot naturally identify and adjust their locomotion to a…
Electric quadruped robots used in outdoor exploration are susceptible to leg-related electrical or mechanical failures. Unexpected joint power loss and joint locking can immediately pose a falling threat. Typically, controllers lack the…
As robots leave the controlled environments of factories to autonomously function in more complex, natural environments, they will have to respond to the inevitable fact that they will become damaged. However, while animals can quickly…
Damage recovery is critical for autonomous robots that need to operate for a long time without assistance. Most current methods are complex and costly because they require anticipating each potential damage in order to have a contingency…
Adaptation to unpredictable damages is crucial for autonomous legged robots, yet existing methods based on multi-policy or meta-learning frameworks face challenges like limited generalization and complex maintenance. To address this issue,…
Integrating Large Language Models (VLMs) and Vision-Language Models (VLMs) with robotic systems enables robots to process and understand complex natural language instructions and visual information. However, a fundamental challenge remains:…
Legged machines are becoming increasingly agile and adaptive but they have so far lacked the morphological diversity of legged animals, which have been rearranged and reshaped to fill millions of niches. Unlike their biological…
The high probability of hardware failures prevents many advanced robots (e.g., legged robots) from being confidently deployed in real-world situations (e.g., post-disaster rescue). Instead of attempting to diagnose the failures, robots…
Robust and accurate proprioceptive state estimation of the main body is crucial for legged robots to execute tasks in extreme environments where exteroceptive sensors, such as LiDARs and cameras, may become unreliable. In this paper, we…
While quadruped robots usually have good stability and load capacity, bipedal robots offer a higher level of flexibility / adaptability to different tasks and environments. A multi-modal legged robot can take the best of both worlds. In…
A robot's mechanical parts routinely wear out from normal functioning and can be lost to injury. For autonomous robots operating in isolated or hostile environments, repair from a human operator is often not possible. Thus, much work has…
Robots have limited adaptation ability compared to humans and animals in the case of damage. However, robot damages are prevalent in real-world applications, especially for robots deployed in extreme environments. The fragility of robots…
The recently introduced Intelligent Trial and Error algorithm (IT\&E) enables robots to creatively adapt to damage in a matter of minutes by combining an off-line evolutionary algorithm and an on-line learning algorithm based on Bayesian…
Model-based control usually relies on an accurate model, which is often obtained from CAD and actuator models. The more accurate the model the better the control performance. However, in bipedal robots that demonstrate high agility actions,…
A vast number of applications for legged robots entail tasks in complex, dynamic environments. But these environments put legged robots at high risk for limb damage. This paper presents an empirical study of fault tolerant dynamic gaits…
If robots are to become ubiquitous, they will need to be able to adapt to complex and dynamic environments. Robots that can adapt their bodies while deployed might be flexible and robust enough to meet this challenge. Previous work on…
Legged robots, specifically quadrupeds, are becoming increasingly attractive for industrial applications such as inspection. However, to leave the laboratory and to become useful to an end user requires reliability in harsh conditions. From…
We present an active embodiment identification method for legged robots that jointly learns information-seeking behavior and explicit embodiment prediction. Using a history-augmented URMA architecture, the method infers joint-level and…