Development of a quadruped robot with continuum inflatable legs

随着几乎所有工业领域对自动化的依赖日益增加，对能够安全地在不同地形和环境中导航的智能机器的需求现在比以往任何时候都更加突出。目前，围绕软机器人的主要困难之一是缺乏可控的移动性。让软机器人在不同的环境中以受控的方式行走而不依赖于刚性肢体是一个难以克服的挑战，需要进一步的研究。大多数行走机器人，如波士顿动力公司的Spot，都是由刚性材料制成的。它们能够像现在这样成功地行走，是依赖于大量的计算机资源，这些资源负责控制它们如何移动。即使配备了这样的计算机能力，Spot在它可以行走的各种地方仍然非常有限。例如，根据用户手册：它不能在潮湿的条件下行走，也不能在任何需要爬上或爬下超过30度斜坡的情况下行走。从这个角度来看：这个角度远低于英国建筑物规例所容许住宅楼梯的最大角度42度。2另一方面，大自然在数百万年前已解决了这个问题。试图在这方面捕捉一些自然智慧的软机器人已经证明在各种高度微妙的情况下是有用的，包括手术，康复，水下探索甚至灾难场景。该项目将在以前所做工作的基础上发展，目标是制造一个可以用四条充气腿行走的机器人，类似于章鱼的四肢。分析相关文献还表明，类似于生物腿的可充气肢体将更能够适应其环境而不需要大量计算能力的假设得到了很大的支持。在撰写本文时，还没有这样的机器人存在;这突出了所提出的研究的重要性。制造四个由充气材料制成的软腿2。要建立一个软（或刚性）框架，可以容纳所有四条腿，以及所需的硬件电源和控制腿移动的方式3。为了使用气动技术来控制腿部的压力，并利用压力的变化使它们行走目的：第一步是通过文献中以前的工作来创建单个可充气腿部设计。一旦这是作出的，它将被测试的基础上如何以及它可以弯曲使用气压。下一步将是制作一个框架（机器人的身体），它将能够容纳四条腿，并根据增加/减少的气压控制它们的移动方式。最后，机器人的性能将根据它在不同环境中行走的情况进行测试，而不依赖于僵硬的四肢或大量的计算机电源。方法研究的主线将基于设计一个完全充气的腿，可以根据内部压力的大小弯曲。这将需要从物理科学的各种不同领域汲取知识。为了成功制造可充气肢体，需要在受控空气加压技术领域进行新的研究，以便机器人不依赖外部空气压缩机。这一切都需要基于强大的传感器网络。将这种传感器应用于拟议的机器人还需要新的研究，以便成功实施。EPSRC校准这是一个广泛的主题，预计将与以下EPSRC主题保持一致，根据https://epsrc.ukri.org/research/ourportfolio/researchareas/:Artificial智能技术控制工程电动机和驱动器/电磁学工程设计图像和视觉计算机器人学传感器和仪器软件工程合成生物学

With the increasing dependence on automation in virtually all parts of industry, the need for intelligent machines that can safely navigate through different terrains and environments is now more pronounced than ever. At present, one of the major difficulties surrounding soft robotics is the lack of controlled mobility. Getting soft robots to walk in a controlled way in different environments without depending on rigid limbs is a difficult challenge to overcome and requires further research.Most walking robots such as Spot by Boston Dynamics are made from rigid material. Their success in being able to walk as well as they do is dependent on heavy computer resources which are responsible for controlling how they move. Even while being armed with such computer power, Spot is still quite limited in the variety of places it can walk in. For example, according to the user's manual: it is not able to walk in wet conditions or in any situation which requires it needs to climb or descend more than 30o inclines. To put this into perspective: this is far less than the maximum angle of 42o allowed by the British Building Regulations for domestic staircases.Nature, on the other hand, has had this problem solved for millions of years. Soft robots which have attempted to capture some of nature's wisdom in this regard have already shown to be useful in a variety of highly delicate situations including surgery, rehabilitation, underwater exploration and even disaster scenarios. This project will develop on work done previously with the ambition of making a robot that can walk on four inflatable legs, similar to, for example: an octopus' limbs. Analysing relevant literature and also shows that there is great support of the hypothesis that inflatable limbs similar to biological legs will be more capable of adapting to their environment without needing massive computational power. As of this writing, no such robot exists; which highlights the importance of the proposed research.AIMS/OBJECTIVESAims:1. To manufacture four soft legs that are made of inflatable material2. To build a soft (or rigid) frame that can hold all four legs, as well as the hardware needed to power and control the way the legs move3. To use pneumatic technology for controlling the pressure in the legs, and getting them to walk using changes in pressureObjectives:The first step is to create a single inflatable leg design will be informed by previous work in the literature. Once the this is made, it will be tested based on how well it can bend using air pressure. The next step will then be to make a frame (the robot's body) which will be able to hold four of these legs and control how they move based on increasing/decreasing air pressure. Finally, the robot's performance will be tested based on how well it can walk in different environments without relying on rigid limbs or massive amounts of computer power.METHODOLOGYThe main line of research will be based on designing a fully inflatable leg that can bend based on the amount of pressure inside. This will require knowledge to be drawn from a variety of different fields in the physical sciences. To successfully make the inflatable limb, new research will need to be conducted in the field of controlled air pressurization technology so that the robot does not depend on an external air compressor. This will all need to be based on a robust network of sensors. The application of such sensors to the proposed robot will also require new research in order to be successfully implemented.EPSRC ALIGNMENTThis is a broad subject and is expected to align with the following EPSRC themes, according to https://epsrc.ukri.org/research/ourportfolio/researchareas/:Artificial intelligence technologiesControl engineeringElectrical motors and drives/electromagneticsEngineering designImage and vision computingRoboticsSensors and instrumentationSoftware engineeringSynthetic biology