Related papers: Embodied intelligence solves the centipede's dilem…
Quadrupedal animals employ diverse galloping strategies to optimize speed, stability, and energy efficiency. However, the biomechanical mechanisms that enable adaptive gait transitions during high-speed locomotion under load remain poorly…
In this paper, we present a new model of biped locomotion which is composed of three linear pendulums (one per leg and one for the whole upper body) to describe stance, swing and torso dynamics. In addition to double support, this model has…
Centipede-like robots offer unique locomotion advantages due to their small cross-sectional area for accessing confined spaces, and their redundant legs enhance robustness in cluttered environments such as search-and-rescue and pipe…
Undulatory locomotion is common to nematodes as well as to limbless vertebrates, but its control is not understood in spite of the identification of hundred of genes involved in Caenorhabditis elegans locomotion. To reveal the mechanisms of…
This paper studies bipedal locomotion as a nonlinear optimization problem based on continuous and discrete dynamics, by simultaneously optimizing the remaining step duration, the next step duration and the foot location to achieve…
Dissipative environments are ubiquitous in nature, from microscopic swimmers in low-Reynolds-number fluids to macroscopic animals in frictional media. In this study, motivated by various behaviours of {\it Caenorhabditis elegans} during…
Overcoming robotics challenges in the real world requires resilient control systems capable of handling a multitude of environments and unforeseen events. Evolutionary optimization using simulations is a promising way to automatically…
The gaits of undulating animals arise from a complex interaction of their central nervous system, muscle, connective tissue, bone, and environment. As a simplifying assumption, many previous studies have often assumed that sufficient…
Animals run robustly in diverse terrain. This locomotion robustness is puzzling because axon conduction velocity is limited to a few ten meters per second. If reflex loops deliver sensory information with significant delays, one would…
The paper presents a method to stabilize dynamic gait for a legged robot with embodied compliance. Our approach introduces a unified description for rigid and compliant bodies to approximate their deformation and a formulation for…
Animals can finely modulate their leg stiffness to interact with complex terrains and absorb sudden shocks. In feats like leaping and sprinting, animals demonstrate a sophisticated interplay of opposing muscle pairs that actively modulate…
Study of the locomotion of a centipede (L. forficatus) at the air-water interface reveals that it does not predominantly use its 14 leg pairs to locomote; unlike most swimmers which propagate head-to-tail body bending waves, this species…
In the context of legged robots, adaptive behavior involves adaptive balancing and adaptive swing foot reflection. While adaptive balancing counteracts perturbations to the robot, adaptive swing foot reflection helps the robot to navigate…
Humans excel at robust bipedal walking in complex natural environments. In each step, they adequately tune the interaction of biomechanical muscle dynamics and neuronal signals to be robust against uncertainties in ground conditions.…
The current study presents a systematic investigation of the locomotion performance of a swimmer with a wide range of parameter settings. Two-dimensional simulations with the immersed boundary method are employed for the fluid-structure…
Although typically possessing four limbs and short bodies, lizards have evolved a diversity of body plans, from short-bodied and fully-limbed to elongate and nearly limbless. Such diversity in body morphology is hypothesized as adaptations…
Inspired by animals that co-adapt their brain and body to interact with the environment, we present a tendon-driven and over-actuated (i.e., n joint, n+1 actuators) bipedal robot that (i) exploits its backdrivable mechanical properties to…
Locomotion is a prime example for adaptive behavior in animals and biological control principles have inspired control architectures for legged robots. While machine learning has been successfully applied to many tasks in recent years, Deep…
Quadrupeds transition spontaneously to various gait patterns (e.g., walk, trot, pace, gallop) in response to the locomotion speed. The generation of these gait patterns has been the subject of debate for a long time. We propose a coupled…
Legged robots have the potential to become vital in maintenance, home support, and exploration scenarios. In order to interact with and manipulate their environments, most legged robots are equipped with a dedicated robot arm, which means…