DALER: a Bio-Inspired Robot That Can Both Fly and Walk

An anonymous reader writes The issue of how to use one robot across multiple terrains is an ongoing question in robotics research. In a paper published in Bioinspiration and Biomimetics today, a team from LIS, EPFL and NCCR Robotics propose a new kind of flying robot that can also walk. Called the DALER (Deployable Air-Land Exploration Robot), the robot uses adaptive morphology inspired by the common vampire bat, Desmodus rotundus, meaning that the wings have been actuated using a foldable skeleton mechanism covered with a soft fabric so that they can be used both as wings and as legs (whegs).

DALEK ?

[Anonymous Coward]

Why not DALEK (Deployable Air-Land Exploration-Killer) and get funds from Defence Department ?

Funny definition of "walk"

[BarbaraHudson]

More like crawl. That it does two jobs - both badly - seems to be the end result.

The proposed use case - flying to an emergency then crawling into unreachable spaces - would be better served by a heli-drone dropping off a ground crawler. No danger of trashing the wings on anything sharp, getting stopped by a twig or a pebble, etc. (if you look at the video, this thing needs a smooth surface to crawl).

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[LifesABeach]

The same could be applied to water based environments. A side benefit would be feedback of the site's conditions.

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[tlambert]

Their funny definition of "walk" is designed to go with their funny definition of "bio-inpired".

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[kazekirifx]

That's what happens when you mimic the morphology of an animal that can hardly "walk" in the first place. Next time, try a bird. They can walk a lot better than bats.

If it could glide and fly

[Jeff Flanagan]

It would be a Dalek.

Crash then Drag

[Migraineman]

I'm not seeing the significance of this. The rectractable wings are of dubious value, as is the "drag" method of locomotion. Would have more value if it could fly, then walk, then fly again. As mentioned in an earler post, a quad copter delivering a crawler would be a better solution, rather than a multi-modal machine that performs neither task particularly well.

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[LifesABeach]

I'm thinking that the addition of a front circular skid would reduce "surface drag debris."

Tunak Tunak Tun Da da da

[Anonymous Coward]

With a name like that, I hope he can also dance to Tunak Tunak Tun.

Why not something like AMEE from The Red Planet?

[clanmclain]

The robot in the Red Planet had a deployable drone that it used for surveillance. Seems like a better model for form and function. Except without the killer military functionality :-) https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]

Weak execution

[losfromla]

It flies effectively but once it hits the ground it moves much like Agrajag did and that is not very gracefully. It also cannot take off again unless picked up and given a throw, I think that the bat that inspired it does not need a human to come by and throw it each time it needs to fly. I guess the use case is that it does a flight mission, lands, then crawls to a hiding spot and dies there while it uploads its data store and waits to be picked up.