27 April reading

Paragraph 3

Insects and Inspired Artificial

Robots
A
The creation of artificial devices with life-like
characteristics has been pursued for over 2,000
years, beginning, as did so many things in our
modern world, in Ancient Greece. For example,
among the inventions of Hero of Alexandria were
a windmill-operated pipe organ and a mechanical
theatrical play.
B
With the raise of cybernetic approaches in the
late 1940s and early 1950s. A wide variety of
electromechanical machines designed to mimic
biological processes and systems were
constructed. Perhaps the best-known and most
directly relevant to biorobotics is W. Gray
Walters’ robotic “tortoises” Elsie and Elmer.
Walters was a physiologist who made important
early contributions to electroencephalography
and clinical neurophysiology. His tortoises were
small mobile robots covered by a hard shell. The
robots were driven by steerable motorized
wheels and possessed a headlight, a light sensor,
and a touch sensor that responded when the
shell was hit. Their behavior was controlled by
electronic circuit analogues of neural circuits. The
behavioral repertoire of the tortoises included
exploration, both positive and negative
phototropism, and obstacle avoidance. The
activation of these different behaviors in
interaction with the robots’ environment could
produce a variety of behavioral sequences.
Although originally designed to explore Walters’
theories of brain function, the tortoises became
objects of popular fascination in much the same
way that ancient automata did.
C
The seeds of the modern renaissance of
biorobotics were sown from the mid 1980s to mid
1990s. A key event in this resurgence was
Rodney Brooks’ work on behavior-based robots.
Although not as directly based on biology as later
work would be, Brooks argues that nontrivial and
flexible behavior in a robot could be generated
by the interaction between simple control
machinery and its environment, demonstrating
his point with robots accomplishing such tasks as
insect-like walking. Another important milestone
was Raibert’s work on hopping and legged
robots, which emphasized the central role of
energetics in the dynamic balance and
locomotion of animals. Based on studies of
serpentine motion, Hirose developed a number of
snake-like locomotors and manipulators. In the
early 1990s, Beer, Quinn, Chiel & Ritzmann
developed a series of hexapod robots based
directly on cockroach and stick insect body
morphology and neural control. Early biorobotic
work on the sensory side includes Franceshini’s
robotic compound eye based on studies of insect
eyes and motion-sensitive neurons in the fly,
Webb’s robotic model of cricket phonotaxis and
Grasso et al’s robotic model of lobster chemical
orientation strategies. An early example of robots
whose control was based on theories of human
brain function is given by the work of Edelman et
al.
D
There has been an explosion of work in
biorobotics in recent years, with robotic vocal
tracts, jaws, retinas, expressive faces, hands,
arms, legs, etc. deployed on robotic worms,
snakes, ants, flies, crickets, cockroaches, walking
stick insects, dinosaurs, bats, lobsters, tuna,
pickerel, turkeys, apes and humanoids. Thus, no
brief survey could possibly do justice to the range
of work being undertaken.
E
A recent example of biologically-inspired robotics
is Spenko et al’s work on a hexapedal robotic
climber called RiSE. In order to grip a vertical
surface, this robot combines both bonding
mechanisms inspired by the structure of gecko
feet and interlocking mechanisms inspired by the
structure of insect spines and claws. In addition,
its design is based on a set of principles that
have been found to be common to many climbing
animals: a sprawled posture keeps the body
close to the surface so as to reduce the pitch-
back moment; front limbs pull inward and rear
limbs push outward so as to counteract the pitch-
back moment; a long body reduces the pull-in
force required of the front limbs; lateral forces
act inward toward the central axis of the body;
complaint legs, ankles and toes so as to
distribute contact forces. Each of the six legs of
RiSE have two degrees of freedom and the robot
also possesses s static tail that presses against
the surface to reduce the pull-in forces required
of the front legs. The robot uses a wave gait in
which only one leg at a time is lifted from the
surface. In addition to an open-loop gait
generator, RiSE utilizes a variety of feedback
controllers, including traction force control,
normal force control and gait regulation. In
addition, the robot has a pawing behavior that
allows a foot that fails to grasp on initial contact
to reestablish a grip on the climbing surface.
Spenko et al have demonstrated that RiSE is able
to traverse a variety of horizontal and vertical
surfaces, including climbing trees and brick or
cinder block walls.
F
A powerful example of biorobotic modeling is
provided by the aerodynamics of insect flight.
Although quasi-steady-state aerodynamical
analyses of the sort used to understand aircraft
have been successfully applied to larger animals,
they have not been very successful for explaining
the generation of lift in small flying insects due to
the tiny wingspans, relatively slow flight speeds
and extremely fast wing movements involved.
However, a recent biorobotic model by Dickinson
and colleagues has begun to shed considerable
light on the unsteady aerodynamics insect flight.
Because of the delicate size and high speed of
insect wings, direct measurement of the forces
involved is extremely difficult. For this reason, a
robotic model with a 60 cm wingspan was used
to explore the non-steady-state airflow during
hovering by the fruit fly Drosophila melanogaster.
In order to reproduce the Reynolds number
relevant to small insects flying in air, their model
was submerged in mineral oil and scaled both in
space and time. Force sensors at the base of one
wing allowed direct measurement of the forces
produced and illumination of air bubbles in the
tank allowed direct observation of the fluid flow
around the robotic wings. Dickinson and
colleagues found that three major mechanisms
contributed to lift generation in the model. First,
vortices formed at the leading edge of the wing
produce lift during much of the power stroke.
Second, additional lift is produced by circulation
of air around the wings due to rapid rotation at
the beginning and end of each stroke. Third,
further forces are produces at the start of each
upstroke and downstroke due to collisions of the
wings with the swirling wake produced by the
previous stroke, a mechanism termed wake
capture. Due to the sensitivity of these latter two
mechanisms to the timing of wing rotation, the
model suggests that the control of small details
of wing motion can be used in steering flight.
Questions 1-6
Choose the most suitable headings for
paragraphs A-F from the list of heading below.
Write appropriate number (i-x) in boxes 1-6 on your answer
sheet.
NB There are more headings than paragraphs, so you will not
use them all.
List of Headings
i A biorobotic model exploring insect flight
ii Modern practices of artificial device usage
iii Robotic climber better than gecko
iv Insect fight inspires the applications of
steering operation
v Prosperity of biorobot family
vi The revival of modern biorobotics
vii Combine machines and environment
viii The advent of robots and their effects on
modern society
ix The most famous biorobot in early days
x Bionics device is not a modern conception
1 Paragraph A
2 Paragraph B
3 Paragraph C
4 Paragraph D
5 Paragraph E
6 Paragraph F
Questions 7-11
Use the information in the passage to match the
people (listed A-E) with opinions or deeds
(listed 7-11) below.
Write the appropriate letters A-E in boxes 7-11 on your answer
sheet.
NB Some people may match more than one discovery.
A W. Gray Walters
B Rodney Brooks
C Michael Dickinson
D Spenko et al
E Edelman et al
7 _________ made contributions to
neurophysiology.
8 _________ endowed robots with agility from the
innovation of machinery environmental fit.
9 _________ generated mechanical intelligence
inspired by the way human brain works
10 _________ modified mechanical models based
on the structure of insects.
11 _________ found the mechanism of insect
flight
Questions 12-13
Choose words from the passage to answer the
questions 12-13, writing NO MORE THAN THREE
WORDS for each blank.
12 What plays the most critical role in Raibert’s
hopping and legged robots?
13 What allowed direct measurement of the
lifting forces of the biorobotic model?