To propel itself higher than any known engineered jumper or animal can, it had to ignore the limits of biology
When engineers want to design robots capable of navigating complex real-world environments, they often turn to the animal kingdom. Such biomimicry has produced bots that run like dogs or cheetahs or hop like birds taking off in flight. But now researchers at the University of California, Santa Barbara, have reached new heights by ignoring the constraints of biological models.
The team designing the new leaper relied on elastic power. In this kind of jumping system, a part called an actuator moves and stores energy in a spring, which is released by a latch to propel an object into the air. This basic mechanism is similar to the one members of the animal kingdom use. For example, a grasshopper’s leg muscle serves as an actuator: when it contracts, it bends back a springlike part of its knee joint to create tension, which is released to propel the insect’s jumps.
The second factor in an elastic jumper’s prowess is the spring’s ability to hold as much energy as possible without packing on too much extra weight. To maximize the new bot’s energy density, the team created a 30-gram device whose whole body acts as the spring. It consists of rubber bands and carbon fiber slats, which have a much higher energy density than biological tissues.
Hawkes is working with NASA to further develop the device. But before it shoots for the moon, the jumper will have to undergo more development. The current prototype has no ability to navigate autonomously, for instance. It also relies on a battery to power its motor and takes a couple of minutes to reload its spring between each jump. And importantly, it cannot control the height of its leap. Still, Hawkes hopes to have a more sophisticated version ready for takeoff in five years.
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