Robert Ringrose of MIT demo’ed a very cool design at AAAI97. His Hopper robot leg stands on its own, and, when activated, hops straight up and down, maintaining its balance. It corrects its balance if you shove it to one side. It can be adjusted to hop forward, backward left, right, etc., simply by changing its center of gravity. The hopper will move in the direction of its mass.This robot needs no brain. It is stabilized by physics. Hopping is a very stable motion. The rotary motion of the motor is turned into a sinusoidal motion which is in series with the spring.   Continue reading →