 A new study has revealed about a novel, fully untethered soft robot capable of repeated jumping and is able to cover half a meter in a single hop-and-roll motion.
The innovative design of this combustion-powered robot, based on a roly-poly toy, and how it returns to an upright position after each jump is described in a fascinating study published in Soft Robotics, a peer-reviewed journal from Mary Ann Liebert, Inc., publishers.
Michael Loepfe, Christoph Schumacher, Urs Lustenberger and Wendelin Stark, Institute for Chemical and Bioengineering (Zurich, Switzerland), describe a soft robot powered by a mixture of nitrous oxide/propane/butane gas that can function even over rough terrain.
The authors provide a detailed description of the activity of the robot and suggest future advances that could improve the jumping ability and performance of the robot.
Editor-in-Chief Barry A. Trimmer said that although this robot is a hybrid of soft and hard components, he thinks it demonstrates how incorporating new materials can open up all sorts of robot capabilities.
