GoQBot: a caterpillar-inspired soft-bodied rolling robot

Rolling locomotion using an external force such as gravity has evolved many times. However, some caterpillars can curl into a wheel and generate their own rolling momentum as part of an escape repertoire. This change in body conformation occurs well within 100 ms and generates a linear velocity over 0.2 m s(-1), making it one of the fastest self-propelled wheeling behaviors in nature. Inspired by this behavior, we construct a soft-bodied robot to explore the dynamics and control issues of ballistic rolling. This robot, called GoQBot, closely mimics caterpillar rolling. Analyzing the whole body kinematics and 2D ground reaction forces at the robot ground anchor reveals about 1G of acceleration and more than 200…

• DA
  Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency