Walking Robot Switches Gaits Autonomously and Flexibly
Sunday, January 17, 2010 - 16:35
in Biology & Nature
Even simple insects can generate quite different movement patterns with their six legs. The animal uses various gaits depending on whether it crawls uphill or downhill, slowly or fast. Scientists have now developed a walking robot, which can flexibly and autonomously switch between different gaits. The success of their solution lies in its simplicity: a small and simple network with just a few connections can create very diverse movement patterns. To this end, the robot uses a mechanism for "chaos control."