Robot Takes “Snakes and Ladders” Quite Literally (VIDEO)

(The AEGIS Alliance) – Scary looking, but may assist disaster rescuers to access tight spaces.

Robots are not yet able to think for themselves, but if someday they do, you would have nowhere to hide from them. Researchers at the University of Electro-Communications and Kyoto University have unveiled a snake-like robot that is capable of climbing up a ladder in a literal version of the well known children’s board game. Even though it isn’t the first snake robot in the world, the latest model displayed at the 2018 IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Intelligence Robots and Systems, appears to be the most agile robot snake yet.

It is able to do one thing very well for now. “This paper presents a method that allows a snake robot to climb a ladder,” the abstract says. “We designed a novel gait for the snake using a gait design method that configures the target form of the snake robot by connecting simple shapes. The climbing motion is executed via shift control and the corresponding motion required to catch the next step on the ladder. In addition, we developed a snake robot that has a smooth exterior body surface through construction of pectinate-shaped parts of the links.” it continued.

Setting jokes aside, the “snakebot” (better names are needed if you have some suggestions) may serve as a very useful purpose. Since it is capable of climbing both vertical and inclined ladders, it would be able to access disaster areas that rescuers can’t reach to search for survivors, or entering into a mine after it has collapsed. Even if nothing is done with it, it’s pretty neat, in a creepy way for some, to just see what it can do in action. Here it is in the video below in action.

Featured Image: Kyoto University and the University of Electro-Communications
2018 IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS), October 1-5, 2018, Madrid, Spain

Kyle James Lee – The AEGIS Alliance – This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.