The development of robots inspired by animals continues with the introduction of a snake-like robot that uses its head and its tail to walk.
The machine, called "ReBiS" (Reconfigurable Bipedal Snake Robot) made its debut at last month's (IROS) Intelligent Robots and Systems event in Chicago, where it demonstrated its ability to walk around on its head and tail, according to IEEE Spectrum. Creators of the robot include researchers Rohan Thakker, Ajinkya Kamat, Sachin Bharambe, Shital Chiddarwar, and K.M. Bhurchandi.
Snakes have served as an inspiration for many robot developers in designing the movements of their creations. Robots with this design have shown to be able to move laterally by rolling. This movement can be helpful when trying to climb cylinders and get through obstacles, but it is not how a real snake moves.
While modular snake robots have the ability to reconfigure themselves into biped, giving themselves two legs to walk on, this ability is much more complicated to master than walking as they normally do, IEEE Spectrum reported.
ReBiS is currently just a proof of concept experiment, and the research team is looking to test robots with more gaits and modules so they can figure out what will be the best way for the robot to walk across tough and rugged terrain.
