Related papers: The Hidden Wheel-Within
The collective ability of organisms to move coherently in space and time is ubiquitous in any group of autonomous agents that can move and sense each other and the environment. Here we investigate the origin of collective motion and its…
We posit that embodied artificial intelligence is not only a computational, but also a materials problem. While the importance of material and structural properties in the control loop are well understood, materials can take an active role…
A mathematical model is derived for the dynamics of a cylinder, or wheel, rolling over a thin viscous film. The model combines the Reynolds lubrication equation for the fluid with an equation of motion for the wheel. Two asymptotic limits…
Evolution is the fundamental physical process that gives rise to biological phenomena. Yet it is widely treated as a subset of population genetics, and thus its scope is artificially limited. As a result, the key issues of how rapidly…
Recent advances in machine learning have dramatically improved our ability to model language, vision, and other high-dimensional data, yet they continue to struggle with one of the most fundamental aspects of biological systems: movement.…
In this paper, we study the circle formation problem by multiple autonomous and homogeneous disc-shaped robots (also known as fat robots). The goal of the robots is to place themselves on the periphery of a circle. Circle formation has many…
Robots operating in the real world will experience a range of different environments and tasks. It is essential for the robot to have the ability to adapt to its surroundings to work efficiently in changing conditions. Evolutionary robotics…
We show that bodies with two planes of symmetry can display a range of behaviors even without inertia. Any such body supports a conserved quantity in its dynamics, and is either a settler, a drifter or a flutterer, depending only on its…
We study the dynamical response of a circularly-driven rigid body, focusing on the description of intrinsic rotational behavior (reverse rotations). The model system we address is integrable but nontrivial, allowing for qualitative and…
Bats' dynamic morphing wings are known to be extremely high-dimensional, and they employ the combination of inertial dynamics and aerodynamics manipulations to showcase extremely agile maneuvers. Bats heavily rely on their highly flexible…
A nonholonomic under-actuated robot with a bounded control range travels inside an unknown and unstructured 3D tunnel bounded by a generic 2D surface. The robot has access to the nearest point of the surface and measures the distance to the…
Empirical observations indicate striking similarities among locomotion in terrestrial animals, birds, and fish, but unifying physical grounds are lacking. When applied to efficient locomotion, the analytical mechanics principle of minimum…
Dense suspensions of fine particles are significant in numerous biological, industrial, and natural phenomena. They also provide an ideal tool to develop statistical mechanics description for out-of-equilibrium systems. Predicting the bulk…
Bristle-bots are legged robots that can be easily made out of a toothbrush head and a small vibrating engine. Despite their simple appearance, the mechanism enabling them to propel themselves by exploiting friction with the substrate is far…
Oscillations are observed in all branches of science and culture, ranging from the behavior of ele-mentary particles, atoms, molecules in simple chemical or physical systems or even in complex organisms, up to oscillations of the behavior…
Snake robots are characterized by their ability to navigate through small spaces and loose terrain by utilizing efficient cyclic forms of locomotion. Soft snake robots are a subset of these robots which utilize soft, compliant actuators to…
Fluid dynamics, and flight in particular, is a domain where organisms challenge our understanding of its physics. Integrating the current knowledge of animal flight, we propose to revisit the use of live animals to study physical phenomena.…
Soft robots, compared to rigid robots, possess inherent advantages, including higher degrees of freedom, compliance, and enhanced safety, which have contributed to their increasing application across various fields. Among these benefits,…
Recent advances in human mobility research have revealed consistent pairwise characteristics in movement behavior, yet existing mobility models often overlook the spatial and topological structure of mobility networks. By analyzing millions…
A spherical robot has many practical advantages as the entire electronics are protected within a hull and can be carried easily by any Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV). However, its use is limited due to finding mounts for sensors. Pendulum…