Soft robots that can traverse through diverse environments, swim, crawl, and wiggle like real animals may sound like something out of a sci-fi movie, but researchers from MIT have brought us one step closer to this reality with their latest development - SoftZoo.
Virtual Wonderland
The bio-inspired platform is a virtual wonderland featuring 3D models of a variety of creatures, such as panda bears, fishes, sharks, and caterpillars, that can perform various tasks in different environments, whether it be by snow, desert, clay, or water. It is almost like having a virtual zoo at your fingertips!
But this is not just for fun and games. The SoftZoo platform is optimized for soft robot co-design, allowing engineers to study the best strategies for robots to interact with their environments.
The framework optimizes algorithms that determine what the robot will look like and how it will move, enabling users to automatically generate outlines for potential machines.
Soft robotics is a subfield of robotics that focuses on the design and construction of robots using soft, flexible, and deformable materials. This approach is inspired by nature, where many organisms have soft and compliant bodies that enable them to move in complex and dynamic environments.
The MIT team claims that the platform is more comprehensive than similar ones, as it models movement that responds to the physical features of different biomes.
The multiphysics engine that can be differentiated enables the simulation of various physical aspects of a system concurrently, which cuts down the need for multiple costly simulations to resolve computational control and design dilemmas.
SoftZoo provides the opportunity for designers to create the brain and body of a robot at the same time, optimizing both land and water machines to become more specialized and aware.
"This computational approach to co-designing the soft robot bodies and their brains (that is, their controllers) opens the door to rapidly creating customized machines that are designed for a specific task," says Daniela Rus, director of CSAIL and the Andrew and Erna Viterbi Professor in the MIT Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science.
But that's not all. SoftZoo emphasizes the significance of morphology, which is the examination of the forms, shapes, and sizes of diverse organisms.
Environment-specific Artificial Life Forms
Depending on the surroundings, certain biological structures are more advantageous than others, similar to the comparison of blueprints for machines that execute comparable tasks.
SoftZoo can serve as an inspiration for creating more specialized, environment-specific artificial life forms.
The possibilities for applying SoftZoo are boundless, ranging from search and rescue missions to exploration. However, the existing limitations of production methods hinder the realization of these soft robot designs.
Nevertheless, the team is already striving to overcome these obstacles, paving the way for a future in which soft robots can roam freely like actual animals.
In the meantime, we can all enjoy our virtual safari through the SoftZoo platform and marvel at the incredible advancements in soft robotics technology. Who knows? Maybe one day, we will see a soft robot that moves and behaves just like a real panda bear!
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