Echinoderm-Inspired Tube Feet for Robust Robot Locomotion and Adhesion
Michael A. Bell, Isabella Pestovski, William L. Scott, Kitty Kumar, Mohammad K. Jawed, Derek A. Paley, Carmel Majidi, James C. Weaver
Abstract
Movement in echinoderms is facilitated by the coordinated activity of thousands of individually addressable and reversibly adhesive tube feet. To investigate the potential applicability of these unique biological actuators as a locomotory structure for robotics applications, we describe here the design, fabrication, and evaluation of an elastomeric structural analogue. The synthetic tube feet were modeled as bistable deformable domes, containing an embedded magnet to facilitate the reversible attachment to ferromagnetic materials. Two unique robots were developed using the bistability of these domes - CircleBot, which is capable of rolling on ferrous surfaces using a pull and roll technique, and PlanarBot, which uses a programmed deflection direction in the domes to move in a plane.
BibTeX
@inproceedings{ral2018_echinoderminspir,
title = {Echinoderm-Inspired Tube Feet for Robust Robot Locomotion and Adhesion},
author = {Michael A. Bell and Isabella Pestovski and William L. Scott and Kitty Kumar and Mohammad K. Jawed and Derek A. Paley and Carmel Majidi and James C. Weaver and Robert J. Wood},
booktitle = {RA-L 2018},
year = {2018}
}