XRL Hexapod Robot Gets a Tail, Learns To Use It 52
New submitter toygeek writes "In an effort to give various robots more control during free-fall and navigation of severe obstacles, researchers have studied how agama lizards use their tails to retain or correct orientation during leaps and jumps. They've applied the research to both hexapod and wheeled robots, and the results are both astounding, and outstanding!"
Re: (Score:1)
Re: (Score:2)
Life is a gift and your misery is in your mind only.
Whose gift to whom?
External circumstances do not matter, only what you think matters. Do you really want to hurt and destroy the love of your life like this? She would be devastated by this. Do you have a mother, father? Other family? What will this do to them?
If external circumstances do not matter, then he is hardly "destroying" love of his life. She will get over it and find someone else in time.
I know, the death of someone close to you is a pain you can never erase, but if that person had killed themselves it would be so much worse because it would be so senseless.
Accidents are senseless, suicide has actual reason.
You seem like someone who cares about others, so why would you do so selfish and cowardly an act as this? And cause all this pain to all those who love you?
Where did that "suicide is cowardly" nonsense came from?
Don't. Get help. You don't have to do this.
It is his life and he has the right to do with it whatever he pleases. Including ending it.
It gets better.
Yeah, and dozen other things get worse. Suicide at least is surefire way to end all past, present and future problems.
Re: (Score:2)
Accidents are senseless, suicide has actual reason.
So does murder. You're ok with murder?
Where did that "suicide is cowardly" nonsense came from?
Suicide is an escape; a coward's escape. It's also the ultimate in selfishness.
It is his life and he has the right to do with it whatever he pleases. Including ending it.
And it's the GP's right to try and do the decent thing and try to talk him out of it, instead of the evil you are doing by cheering the GGP's suicide on. What kind of a God damned monster are you?
Re: (Score:2)
Accidents are senseless, suicide has actual reason.
So does murder. You're ok with murder?
As with everything, the answer is "it depends". I am sure you are able to come up with a scenario which makes murder best option available.
Where did that "suicide is cowardly" nonsense came from?
Suicide is an escape; a coward's escape. It's also the ultimate in selfishness.
Says your holy book?
It is his life and he has the right to do with it whatever he pleases. Including ending it.
And it's the GP's right to try and do the decent thing and try to talk him out of it, instead of the evil you are doing by cheering the GGP's suicide on.
Decent thing is to let him decide what he wants to do with *his* life. His, not yours or anybody else.
What kind of a God damned monster are you? OH, I see, an athiest, maybe even an antitheist. Carry on, then. You'll find out in the end, poor fool.
Suicide at least is surefire way to end all past, present and future problems. Again, you're going to be pretty damed surprised when your own end comes.
Your religious ranting is not even worth responding to.
Re: (Score:2)
I am sure you are able to come up with a scenario which makes murder best option available.
I can't.
Says your holy book?
If it says that I must have missed that part.
Decent thing is to let him decide what he wants to do with *his* life. His, not yours or anybody else.
The DECENT thing to do is to try to talk him, not force him, into doing the right thing.
Your religious ranting is not even worth responding to.
Yet you responded anyway.
Re: (Score:1)
All I need to say is that someday you must regret this. Encouraging someone to suicide is Nazy-level of evil.
Re: (Score:1)
Re: (Score:2)
think about how you're gonna explain yourself to God when you're asked why you ended your life before it was meant to be.
There are a lot of athiests here, he may not believe in God (boy, is he going to be surprised when he finds out!)
Re: (Score:2, Funny)
What about the people who have to clean up your body? What about how your wife would feel knowing that you did this.
If you're not a troll, and you're depressed, then things will get better. They always do.
If you're in debt, do what rich people do and declare yourself bankrupt.
Why you pick the name zizzlezazzledazzle?
Re: (Score:1)
STOP AND READ THIS PLEASE (Score:2, Offtopic)
If you aren't in fact a troll, then please stop. Get help. Go to your nearest hospital, tell them your plan, and be honest.
Suicide is a permanent solution to a temporary problem.
I have been *this* close to stepping in front of a fast moving train. I went to my psychologist, and I spent a week in a mental hospital. It saved my life. I was on very strong anti-depressants for over 10 years, and am now (prescription and otherwise) drug free. If anyone's ever been completely whacked in the head, and ready to kil
Re: (Score:2)
Sometimes your brain is not your friend (Score:1)
I have thought about it. Often. But probably not come as close as you sound like you are.
But bear this in mind: your brain cannot tell when it is coming up with the wrong answers to questions. There is no error-detection / correction. So you need to rely on other people to help solve problems sometimes.
Having a "plan" may trick your brain into thinking that it feels better. But you have not solved any problem with this plan; its illusion.
Try to have one good day. Just forget about your problems a
Re: (Score:2)
Suicide is a permanent solution to a temporary problem. How could you want to hurt the woman you say you love? Please get professional help. Today there are effective treatments for your mental illness.
Use sound reason - save your life! (Score:1)
Your brain may be tricking you. Suicide is absurd. Life is better than death. It is great to exist. If your brain tells you otherwise, most likely it is buggy. Get professional help. Please!
And a suicide is _awful_ for your friends and loved ones. Besides the expected sadness of losing a friend, they will be tormented by thoughts of "would he have decided otherwise if I had been a better friend?"
Besides, suicide can fail, and then you will add physical disability to your existing problems! I could share so
Gee, you'd think a cat would be better (Score:1)
It could lead to an anti-gravity robot.
Re:Gee, you'd think a cat would be better (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Gee, you'd think a cat would be better (Score:5, Interesting)
I just watched the related videos, and it is impressive just what an up and down tail can do. But you're right that a tail that can move side-to-side, or that can curl or corkscrew can probably do even more to maintain a desired 3D orientation. No doubt that will be future directions for this work. So, in the real world, it seems like a common situation that you want to maintain the orientation of 90% of the mass of an object, and are willing to sacrifice the 3D orientation of 10% for a short time to do that (until the tail orientation can be reset at no body-orientation cost when the creature is on a surface again). Brilliant. These robot videos really show how amazing nature can be. I really appreciate tails in a way I never had before watching those videos. I especially found of interest video about a predecessor robot to this which includes video footage of the long-tailed lizard used as a prototype:
http://spectrum.ieee.org/automaton/robotics/diy/dinosaurlike-tails-make-terrestrial-mobile-robots-more-agile [ieee.org]
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
It depends on how the a cat falls but they can flip in less than a foot if needed.
I've also seen my cat fall from much higher and not recover in time.
I regularly test this one out, she's not to happy being held sometimes so we both screw this move up from time to time.
It's not all tail either, she's using her entire body when she does it.
Re: (Score:1)
You forgot the toast...
Re: (Score:2)
Not only that, a cat uses its tail to turn over in mid-air ...
False. Even a tailess cat lands feet first. Cats use their tails for balance. They turn over in mid-air by twisting their bodies... has nothing to do with their tail.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Thank you. I sit corrected.
too nice! too gracious! (you must be new here). No! I THANK YOU!!
Re: (Score:2)
That crossed my mind as well -- why study lizards when cats are so adept at landing right side up? If they'd studied cats, they'd know that the stronger the cat's tail, the better an athelete the cat is, so it stands to reason that the better designed the robot's tail, the better the robot will be at its job.
For the love of... (Score:4, Funny)
UC Berkeley researchers, please: Stop now. No good can come from this, and we all know it.
We already have enough trouble getting laid, and yet you would put us on the path to anthropomorphic clydesdales?
Re: (Score:2, Informative)
The end of the human race was heralded... (Score:4, Funny)
Re: (Score:1)
Why go to all that trouble? (Score:3, Funny)
They should have just tied a slice of buttered bread to it's back.
Re: (Score:1)
In a butter world... (Score:2)
Imagine what this could do for toast.
Flywheel (Score:5, Informative)
Wouldn't a flywheel be much more practical?
Tail:
-gets caught on stuff
-can only go half a turn
Flywheel:
-can accelerate until the material limits of the fly wheel
-can use the stored energy for recovery.
-can be embedded inside the robot.
-can act as a gyroscope to provide stability in other axes.
Re:Flywheel (Score:4, Informative)
Flywheel is less efficient weight-wise. To re-balance a 8kg robot (or even heavier model later) falling upside down, how heavy / how fast must the flywheel be?
Tail can be further improved by giving it more angles of freedom. We can also let it be able to coil up. Hard to beat tail.
Re: (Score:2)
Define practical; it doesn't get much simpler than a weight on a servo. In contrast, how much torque can you get from a small compact flywheel and how much is it going to cost? How quickly can you regeneratively brake it with decent energy recovery?
(You might be interested in this control-moment gyro controlled ballbot [ucsd.edu].)
Re: (Score:2)
Reaction wheels (or flywheels) and control-moment gyros work differently, even though they can both be used to create torque,
Reaction wheels spin up (or spin down) the wheel to create torque - the axis of the wheel does not change. The tail in this robot is an unusual case of a reaction wheel - it's not actually a wheel, but is uses the same princple.
CMGs [wikipedia.org] use the gyroscopic effect you get from changing the axis of a spinning wheel to create torque. The rotation speed of the wheel is (usually) constant. They
Been there, done that. (Score:5, Interesting)
Worked that out back in 1995. See this the "running on rough terrain video. [animats.com] Watch at 1:40.
The next step, which the U. Penn people don't seem to have taken yet, is to solve this as a two-point boundary value problem. Then, instead of trying to maintain attitude during flight, you try to land at a specific time in a specific place with a specific attitude.
Doing that is rocket science. Rocket science is about control of underactuated systems, where the control system has fewer actuators than there are degrees of freedom to be controlled. You want to reach a specified point at a specified time at a specified velocity in a specified attitude. All you have available is the ability to thrust in one direction and to change attitude slowly. But this problem is solveable and there are known solutions. Applying that to robots leads to gymnastics.
The quadrotor people are already doing this kind of thing, but it hasn't been done much for legged machines yet.
Re: (Score:2)
The graphics are scruffy and the music is annoying first thing in the morning, but it's very impressive.
True. That was made on a Mac IIci, and the audio is 8-bit. It took hours to run a simulation like that back then. I spent a few years after that working on simulation technology.
Simulating real legged machines with realistic simulation of ground contact is still a CPU hog today. Video games mostly fake their contact physics.
Never mind robots... (Score:3)
But why a tail? Isn't a flywheel/gyroscope better? (Score:3)
Two legs and two tails is best (Score:2)
Since you are dealing with 3D space, you will need *4* points of awareness to keep the center of gravity in balance. You might think that 3 legs and one tail would be best, but then you have to deal with a disbalanced processing problem: triangulation in space, followed by an add-on to balance that. Better to deal with three 2-point axle balancing problems instead. (A:B, C:D, AB:CD).