An agile jumping robot developed by U.S. scientists who drew inspiration from one of the animal world’s best leapers could one day help in rescue efforts after earthquakes or building collapses.
The robot can jump one metre in less than one second, according to the report in the journal Science Robotics.
Known as Salto, the 26-cm tall robot can leap higher than a bullfrog and almost as high as a galago, or bush baby, a small primate found in Africa. That’s better than a human but not the highest of any robot — other machines have been made that can jump more than three meters in a single leap.
But Salto does hold the crown in vertical-jumping agility, which researchers define as the ratio of the maximum jump height to the time it takes to complete one jump. “To have a high vertical-jumping agility, you have to be able to jump high and do it quickly,” explained Duncan Haldane, a researcher at the University of California, Berkeley, and lead author of the study.
According to co-author Justin Yin, “Salto can jump to a height of one metre in 0.58 seconds and be immediately ready to jump again.”
It also attains 78 percent of a galago’s vertical-jumping agility, said the report.
Salto, which stands for “saltatorial locomotion on terrain obstacles,” weighs just 100 grams.
The one-legged robot can jump from the floor, flip forward and then kick off a wall, reaching even greater heights.
Researchers hope it will aid rescuers by offering a service that can easily navigate rubble and tough terrain.
“Our goal was to have a search-and-rescue robot small enough to not disturb the rubble further, and to move quickly across the many kinds of rubble produced by collapsed buildings.”
The robot would not be powerful enough to pull a person out of a collapsed building, but can be equipped with sensors to tip off rescuers to the location of a trapped person. — AFP
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