From biologically-inspired robots to reality: Snake and quadruped walking

Mother Nature is a precious source of imagination to develop a new type of robotic system. I was inspired by the motion of snakes in 1971 and since then I have been studying and developing several types of snake-like robots. Among these robots, I will discuss the design and control of amphibious snake-like robot ACM R-5 which made 3D swimming motion in swimming pool, and the latest type of snake-like rescue robot Souryu V which consists of three crawler units connected in series. I also started the study of a walking robot inspired by the walking motion of a spider. I will introduce our on-going research about the quadruped walking robot. I will introduce our on-going research about the quadruped walking robot. I will especially discuss the design of our latest model TITAN XI which weighs 7 tons and has legs with 3.7 m in length and which are designed to perform construction tasks on a steep slope.