#439700 Video Friday: Robot Gecko Smashes Face ...

Your weekly selection of awesome robot videos

Video Friday is your weekly selection of awesome robotics videos, collected by your friends at IEEE Spectrum robotics. We'll also be posting a weekly calendar of upcoming robotics events for the next few months; here's what we have so far (send us your events!):

DARPA SubT Finals – September 21-23, 2021 – Louisville, KY, USA

WeRobot 2021 – September 23-25, 2021 – [Online Event]

IROS 2021 – September 27-1, 2021 – [Online Event]

ROSCon 2021 – October 20-21, 2021 – [Online Event]

Let us know if you have suggestions for next week, and enjoy today's videos.

The incredible title of this paper is "Tails stabilize landing of gliding geckos crashing head-first into tree trunks." No hype here at all: geckos really do glide, they really do crash head-first into tree trunks, and they really do rely on their tails for post-landing stabilization and look ridiculous while doing it.

Their gecko-inspired robot features a soft torso, where the tail can be taken off and put back on. When the front foot hits a surface, the robot is programmed to bend its tail just like the reflex that Jusufi discovered previously in climbing geckos. The information is processed via a microcontroller on the shoulder. This signal activates the motor to pull on a tendon and hence pushes the tail into the wall to slow the head over heels pitchback.

"Nature has many unexpected, elegant solutions to engineering problems—and this is wonderfully illustrated by the way geckos can use their tails to turn a head-first collision into a successful perching maneuver. Landing from flight is difficult, and we hope our findings will lead to new techniques for robot mobility—sometimes crashes are helpful," Robert Siddall describes.

[ Paper ] via [ UC Berkeley ]

Thanks, Robert!

The subterranean stage is being set for the DARPA Subterranean Challenge Final Event at Louisville's Mega Cavern. The event is the culmination of a vision to revolutionize search and rescue using robots in underground domains. Tune in Sept 21-24 on SubTV.

I'll be there!

[ SubT ]

Remote work has been solved thanks to Robovie-Z.

[ Vstone ]

The best part of this video is not the tube-launched net-firing drone-hunting drone, it's the logo of the giant chameleon perched on top of a Humvee firing its tongue at a bug while being attacked by bats for some reason.

[ Dynetics ]

I'm pretty sure this is an old video, but any robot named "Schmoobot" has a place in Video Friday.

LET ME TAKE YOU TO THE LOCATION OF JUICES

[ Ballbot ]

Some more recent videos on Ballbot, and we're very happy that it's still an active research platform!

The CMU ballbot using its whole body controller to maintain balance on top of its ball while also balancing a red cup with water on the right hand while tracking a circular motion and an empty water bottle on the left hand.

[ Ballbot ]

On Aug. 18, 2021, the MQ25 T1 test asset refueled a U.S. Navy E-2D Hawkeye command-and-control aircraft. This is the unmanned aerial refueler's second refueling mission.

Not to throw shade here, but I think the robot plane landed a little bit better than the human piloted plane.

[ Boeing ]

We proposed a method to wirelessly drive multiple soft actuators by laser projection. Laser projection enables both wireless energy supply and the selection of target actuators. Thus, we do not need additional components such as electric circuits and batteries to achieve simple and scalable implementation of multiple soft actuators.

[ Takefumi Hiraki ]

Thanks, Fan!

In this video, we demonstrated the motion of our biped robot "Robovie-Z", which we used to enter the "ROBO-ONE Ultimate Action" contest.

[ Robo-One ]

Some impressive performance here, but that poor drone is overstuffed.

[ RISLab ]

Proximity sensors and analog circuits are all it takes to make a fairly high performance manipulation.

[ Keisuke Koyama ]

Thanks, Fan!

This video showcases an LP control algorithm producing both gravitational load compensation and cuff force amplification capabilities via whole-body exoskeleton forces. Parts of this video contain an additional payload of 25lbs (a weight on the back).

[ UT Austin HCRL ]

An overview of Tertill the solar-powered weeding robot for home gardens. Watch Joe Jones, the inventor of Tertill (and Roomba!) talk about how the robot and how and where it works.

[ Tertill ]

One small step integrating our Extend AMAS VR software to operate Universal Robots UR5e. This VR application combines volumetric telepresence technology with interactive digital twin to provide intuitive interface for non-robotic expert to teleoperate or program the robot from remote location over the internet.

[ Extend Robotics ]

Enrollment is open for a pair of online courses taught by Christoph Bartneck that'll earn you a Professional Certificate in Human-Robot Interaction. While the website really wants you to think that it costs you $448.20, if you register, you can skip the fee and take the courses for free! The book is even free, too. I have no idea how they can afford to do this, but good on them, right?

[ edX ]

Thanks, Christoph!

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