Current Issue : January - March Volume : 2016 Issue Number : 1 Articles : 6 Articles
Action selection (AS) is thought to represent the mechanism involved by natural agents when deciding what should be the next\nmove or action. Is there a functional elementary core sustaining this cognitive process? Could we reproduce themechanism with an\nartificial agent and more specifically in a neurorobotic paradigm?Unsupervised autonomous robots may require a decision-making\nskill to evolve in the real world and the bioinspired approach is the avenue explored through this paper.We propose simulating an\nAS process by using a small spiking neural network (SNN) as the lower neural organisms, in order to control virtual and physical\nrobots.We base ourAS process on a simple central pattern generator (CPG), decision neurons, sensory neurons, andmotor neurons\nas themain circuit components.As novelty, this study targets a specific operant conditioning (OC) context which is relevant in an AS\nprocess; choices do influence future sensory feedback. Using a simple adaptive scenario, we show the complementarity interaction\nof both phenomena.We also suggest that this AS kernel could be a fast track model to efficiently design complex SNN which include\na growing number of input stimuli and motor outputs. Our results demonstrate that merging AS and OC brings flexibility to the\nbehavior in generic dynamical situations....
Terrestrial hermit crabs which are a type of hermit crabs live on land, whereas typical hermit crabs inhabit the sea. They have\nan ability of climbing a tree vertically. Their claws allow them to hang on the tree. In this study, an outer-pipe inspection robot\nwas developed. Its locomotion mechanism was developed in imitation of the terrestrial hermit crab�s claws. It is equipped with two\nrimless wheels. Each of the spokes is tipped with a neodymium magnet, which allows the robot to remain attached to even a vertical\nsteel pipe.Moreover, the robot has a mechanism for adjusting the camber angle of the right and left wheels, allowing it to tightly grip\npipes with different diameters. Experiments were conducted to check the performance of the robot using steel pipes with different\ndiameters, placed horizontally, vertically, or obliquely. The robot attempted to move a certain distance along a pipe, and its success\nrate was measured. It was found that the robot could successfully travel along pipes with vertical orientations, although it sometimes\nfell from oblique or horizontal pipes. The most likely reason for this is identified and discussed. Certain results were obtained in\nlaboratory. Further experiments in actual environment are required....
Biomimetics takes nature as a model for inspiration to immensely help abstract new principles and ideas to develop various devices\nfor real applications. In order to improve the stability and maneuvering of biomimetic fish like underwater propulsors, we selected\nbluespotted ray that propel themselves by taking advantage of their pectoral fins as target. First, a biomimetic robotic undulating\nfin driven propulsor was built based on the simplified pectoral structure of living bluespotted ray. The mechanical structure and\ncontrol circuit were then presented. The fin undulating motion patterns, fin ray angle, and fin shape to be investigated are briefly\nintroduced. Later, the kinematic analysis of fin ray and the whole fin is discussed.The influence of various kinematic parameters and\nmorphological parameters on the average propulsion velocity of the propulsor was analyzed. Finally, we conclude that the average\npropulsion velocity generally increases with the increase of kinematic parameters such as frequency, amplitude, and wavelength,\nrespectively.Moreover, it also has a certain relationship with fin undulating motion patterns, fin ray angle, fin shape, and fin aspect\nratio....
We have developed a biologically inspired reconfigurable quadruped robot which can performwalking and rolling locomotion and\ntransformbetween walking and rolling by reconfiguring its legs. This paper presents an approach to control rolling locomotion with\nthe biologically inspired quadruped robot. For controlling rolling locomotion, a controller which can compensate robot�s energy\nloss during rolling locomotion is designed based on a dynamic model of the quadruped robot.Thedynamic model describes planar\nrolling locomotion based on an assumption that the quadruped robot does not fall down while rolling and the influences of collision\nand contact with the ground, and it is applied for computing the mechanical energy and a plant in a numerical simulation. The\nnumerical simulation of rolling locomotion on the flat ground verifies the effectiveness of the proposed controller.The simulation\nresults show that the quadruped robot can perform periodic rolling locomotion with the proposed energy-based controller. In\nconclusion, it is shown that the proposed control approach is effective in achieving the periodic rolling locomotion on the flat\nground....
The octopus arm has attracted many researchers� interests and became a research hot spot because of its amazing features. Several\ndynamic models inspired by an octopus arm are presented to realize the structure with a large number of degrees of freedom. The\noctopus arm is made of a soft material introducing high-dimensionality, nonlinearity, and elasticity, which makes the octopus arm\ndifficult to control. In this paper, three coupled central pattern generators (CPGs) are built and a 2-dimensional dynamic model\nof the octopus arm is presented to explore possible strategies of the octopus movement control. And the CPGs� signals treated as\nactivation are added on the ventral, dorsal, and transversal sides, respectively.The effects of the octopus arm are discussed when\nthe parameters of the CPGs are changed. Simulations show that the octopus arm movements are mainly determined by the shapes\nof three CPGs� phase diagrams. Therefore, some locomotion modes are supposed to be embedded in the neuromuscular system\nof the octopus arm. And the octopus arm movements can be achieved by modulating the parameters of the CPGs. The results are\nbeneficial for researchers to understand the octopus movement further....
Currently, a bottleneck problem for battery-powered microflying robots is time of endurance. Inspired by flying animal behavior in\nnature, an innovative mechanism with active flying and perching in the three-dimensional space was proposed to greatly increase\nmission life and more importantly execute tasks perching on an object in the stationary way. In prior work, we have developed some\nprototypes of flying and perching robots. However, when the robots switch between flying and perching, it is a challenging issue to\ndeal with the contact between the robot and environment under the traditional position control without considering the stationary\nobstacle and external force. Therefore, we propose a unified impedance control approach for bioinspired flying and perching robots\nto smoothly contact with the environment. The dynamic model of the bioinspired robot is deduced, and the proposed impedance\ncontrol method is employed to control the contact force and displacement with the environment. Simulations including the top\nperching and side perching and the preliminary experiments were conducted to validate the proposed method. Both simulation\nand experimental results validate the feasibility of the proposed control methods for controlling a bioinspired flying and perching\nrobot....
Loading....