Soft Bodied Hexapedal Robot

Patent Status

Background

Soft robots have many advantages over traditional rigid-bodied robots.  For example, they cost less to manufacture when compared to rigid-bodied robots.  In addition they can be engineered to have bioinspired properties such as self-healing bodies.  The applications for soft bodied robots include biomedical, manufacturing and search and rescue. However as the field of robotics evolves, additional applications may be developed for soft bodied robots

Brief Description

Prof. Konstantinos Karydis’ lab at the University of California, Riverside has developed a soft hexapedal robot (SoRx) that may serve as a new tool to applications where operation over rough and/or unstructured terrain is required.  For example when looking for survivors in the aftermath of an earthquake this soft legged robot may be easily deployed. Operation in such terrains still challenges more rigid legged robots; instead, soft legged robots could squeeze and bend to overcome obstacles and fit into crevices to explore their environment.

Fig 1: shows that SoRX maintains stable locomotion on an unstable platform that is oscillating in the X-Y plane at speeds comparable to the robot’s forward speed,

Applications

• Used for agricultural applications like surveillance and harvesting.
• For use in search and rescue operations.
• May be used for biomedical applications like robotic surgery.
• May be used as a recreational device for hobbyists
• Adapted as an educational product
  

Related Materials

• 2020 IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA) - 05/31/2020