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Learning policies in simulation is promising for reducing human effort when training robot controllers. This is especially true for soft robots that are more adaptive and safe but also more difficult to accurately model and control. The…
Tensegrity robots, composed of rigid rods and flexible cables, are difficult to accurately model and control given the presence of complex dynamics and high number of DoFs. Differentiable physics engines have been recently proposed as a…
Robots often interact with the world via attached parts such as wheels, joints, or appendages. In many systems, these interactions, and the manner in which they lead to locomotion, can be understood using the machinery of geometric…
Tensegrity robots offer compliance and adaptability, but their nonlinear, and underconstrained dynamics make state estimation challenging. Reliable continuous-time estimation of all rigid links is crucial for closed-loop control, system…
The adaptability of soft robots makes them ideal candidates to maneuver through unstructured environments. However, locomotion challenges arise due to complexities in modeling the body mechanics, actuation, and robot-environment dynamics.…
Endowed with inherent dynamical properties that grant them remarkable ruggedness and adaptability, spherical tensegrity robots stand as prototypical examples of hybrid softrigid designs and excellent mobile platforms. However, path planning…
Multi-legged mobile robots possess high mobility performance in rough terrain environments, stemming from their high postural stability, joint flexibility, and the redundancy provided by multiple legs. In prior research on navigating…
When a big and heavy robot moves, it exerts large forces on the environment and on its own structure, its angular momentum can varysubstantially, and even the robot's structure can deform if there is a mechanical weakness. Under these…
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…
The wheeled three-link snake robot is a well-known example of an underactuated system modelled using nonholonomic constraints, preventing lateral slippage (skid) of the wheels. A kinematically controlled configuration assumes that both…
Drifting is an advanced driving technique where the wheeled robot's tire-ground interaction breaks the common non-holonomic pure rolling constraint. This allows high-maneuverability tasks like quick cornering, and steady-state drifting…
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…
Passive tumbling uses natural forces like gravity for efficient travel. But without an active means of control, passive tumblers must rely entirely on external forces. Northeastern University's COBRA is a snake robot that can morph into a…
Wheeled-legged robots have the potential for highly agile and versatile locomotion. The combination of legs and wheels might be a solution for any real-world application requiring rapid, and long-distance mobility skills on challenging…
Mobile robots are ubiquitous. Such vehicles benefit from well-designed and calibrated control algorithms ensuring their task execution under precise uncertainty bounds. Yet, in tasks involving humans in the loop, such as elderly or mobility…
This paper deals with the classical problem of exploring a ring by a cohort of synchronous robots. We focus on the perpetual version of this problem in which it is required that each node of the ring is visited by a robot infinitely often.…
Designing an in-pipe climbing robot that manipulates sharp gears to study complex line relationships. Traditional rolling/happening pipe climbing robots tend to slide when exploring pipe curves. The proposed gearbox connects to the farthest…
Although recent years have seen significant progress of humanoid robots in walking and running, the frequent foot strikes with ground during these locomotion gaits inevitably generate high instantaneous impact forces, which leads to…
Frictional contact has been extensively studied as the core underlying behavior of legged locomotion and manipulation, and its nearly-discontinuous nature makes planning and control difficult even when an accurate model of the robot is…
Multi-legged elongate robots hold promise for maneuvering through complex environments. Prior work has demonstrated that reliable locomotion can be achieved using open-loop body undulation and foot placement on rugose terrain. However,…