SWITZERLAND: 'Cheetah cub' robot hits the ground running

Record ID: 401892

  • Title: SWITZERLAND: 'Cheetah cub' robot hits the ground running
  • Date: 18th August 2013
  • Summary: LAUSANNE, SWITZERLAND (JULY 15, 2013) (REUTERS) PETER ECKERT, PHD STUDENT WORKING FOR BIOROBOTICS LAB IN EPFL, AND PART OF CHEETAH CUB TEAM, PICKING UP CHEETAH CUB AND PLACING ON TRACK ECKERT LEADING CHEETAH CUB ON LEAD TOWARDS CAMERA MOTION TRACKING CAMERA ECKERT AND CHEETAH CUB WALK PAST CAMERA (SOUNDBITE) (English) PETER ECKERT, PHD STUDENT WORKING FOR BIOROBOTICS LAB
  • Embargoed: 2nd September 2013 13:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: Switzerland
  • Country: Switzerland
  • Topics: General
  • Reuters ID: LVACDP7BMLKQGOVYYJM64N7U4187
  • Story Text: 'Cheetah Cub' is the fastest four-legged robot of its weight, according to its designers from the Biorobotics-Laboratory at EPFL (École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne) although it's the cheetah's agility, rather than its speed, that they're trying to mimic.
    According to team member Peter Eckert, the design of Cheetah Cub's legs is based on those of young cheetahs. Capable of 70 mph bursts of speed, adult cheetahs can manoeuvre with precision and extraordinary agility when hunting prey on the run.
    "This is really reproducing the movement of the real animal quite nicely, which can be mostly seen in the gait itself and in the right foot locus (transmission point between the robot and the ground), so the position of the end effecter of the foot," said Eckert.
    The number of leg segrments - three - and their proportions are the same as those of a cat. Springs are used to reproduce tendons, and actuators - small motors that convert electric energy into mechanical movement - represent the muscles.
    "We're reproducing here also the muscle tendon system in the real animal. We see as muscles the actuators located approximately on the trunk and the tendons as the springs in the legs itself," said Eckert.
    Eckert says the robot is the fastest in its category, namely in normalised speed for small quadruped robots under 30 kilograms in weight. During tests Cheetah Cub demonstrated its ability to run nearly seven times its body length in one second.
    According to Eckert, "the performance, the speed, is measured by a motion capturing system and force plates. The motion capturing system is mostly operated by a system of multiple high speed infrared cameras that emit infrared light, which gets reflected by these markers, and in this way we can see where the robot is in the room, so we can see, derive, the speed, the angles, the motion itself."
    The project is aimed at producing independent feline robots that can be sent into disaster zones.
    Although not as agile as a real cat, Eckert says Cheetah Cub displays impressive auto-stabilisation characteristics when running at full speed or over a course that included disturbances, such as small step-downs. In addition, the robot is light, compact, and robust, while being easily assembled from inexpensive and readily available materials.
    The Cheetah team at EPFL's Biorobotics Lab (Biorob) say its morphology gives the robot the mechanical properties from which cats benefit, namely its running ability and elasticity. Eckert says Cheetah Cub is naturally more autonomous than similar robots because it only requires a simple computer program to be started and one button to be pressed by the operator before it walks on its own. Its ability to run over rough terrain gives it other advantages. "We think that a legged robot is able to cope with perturbations like a rough terrain better than a robot with wheels or with tracks. So we see it as a good first step," said Eckert.
    Biorob say the invention is the logical follow-up to its research into locomotion that included devising salamander and lamprey robots.
    The long-term goal of the project is to develop fast, agile, grounded machines for use in exploration, such as search and rescue missions. The Biorob team is currently working on improving existing mechanisms and refining Cheetah Cub's biomechanical parameters so it can go faster and complete more difficult tasks.
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