AMOS
AMOS is a six-leg robot that uses an “Adaptive neural locomotion control” to make a robot automatically learn and adjust its own movement in order to imitate a movement of the real cockroach such as obstacle avoidance and walking through rough terrain.
MORF
MORF is a six-leg robot that uses a “Neural control” to construct a pattern of insect movement. This robot uses a Dynamixel (a digitizer volt motor for a robot) and ROS (Robot Operating System) interface. It also has an “Artificial Hormone” system to help the robot adapt its own height with respect to each stiffness of the terrain.
ALPHA
ALPHA is a dung beetle-like robot based on the functional morphology and biomechanics of the South African dung beetle Scarabaeus galenus. We aim to use this robot for studying the neural mechanisms underlying the dung beetle’s complex behaviors (such as versatile locomotion, object manipulation/transportation, large object rolling, orientation, goal-directed navigation, searching, and homing).
HEXA
Hexa by Vincross is an all-terrain robot equipped with functionalities including a Linux-based OS known as MIND, 720p cameras, 3-axis accelerometer, distance measuring sensor and infrared sensor. The robot is programmable using the MIND SDK, and can also be controlled using the sandboxed simulator and a mobile app. It can interact with the environment based on both optical and spatial sensors, and adapt its movement patterns for walking and climbing.
Bipedal Robot
Bipedal robot is a two-leg robot which mainly uses human movement as an inspiration for exoskeleton development. The aim of the robot is to aid patients who have an issue with their legs, such as elderly and disabled people. This robot uses a Central Pattern Generator (CPG) and also collaborates with a Brain Control Interface (BCI) which uses a brainwave to predict a movement of the human. This system enhances a robot for movement prediction of the users.
iCrawl
iCrawl is an inchworm-inspired crawling robot. The 5 DOF robot relies on two legs, each with electromagnetic feet with soft toes (EROFT), in order to crawl on metal pipe surfaces. The foot design is an abstraction of the leg posture in an inchworm adapting to a round surface. Foot-to-surface adaptability is provided by the inherent elasticity of the soft toe. The proposed EROFT gives the robot adaptability and stability for crawling on metal pipes of various curvatures.
MOVO
MOVO is a mobile manipulator robot from Kinova Inc. It is a research robot mainly designed to help researchers fully understand and study a potential approach to mobile manipulation. This robot uses ROS (Robot Operating System), MoveIt!, and Gazebo as standard developing tools that ease the way to construct a general platform which can be adopted for other types of robots. A main objective of MOVO is to make it automatically interact with humans using a combinatorial learning method to help the robot decide and react to its environment.
Dual-Arm Robot
The dual-arm robot is made up of two Universal Robot robotic arms. It is used in industrial research since it contains two mechanical arms that function together but are controlled separately. A depth camera, a motion tracking sensor, and an infrared sensor are among the external sensors that the robot responds to in order to make the two arms work together; this robot employs ROS (Robot Operating System) and MoveIt!
MIR Robot
The MIR100 robot from Mobile Industrial Robots Inc. is a multifunctional mobile robot designed to improve productivity in logistics and manufacturing operations. We integrate it with the UR3e arm and other sensors to enhance performance not only in manufacturing but also in research. The obstacle avoidance system, object detection, machine learning, and other features make it useful for service tasks.
Turtlebot 3
TurtleBot is a ROS standard platform robot. It is suited for ROS beginners due to the ease of implementation. In the research field, various prototype works can begin development on this robot. It has simple SLAM, navigation, and machine learning capabilities, all of which are essential for a mobile robot.
Medical Robot: EXO-H3
Our mobile robotic lower-limb exoskeleton system is the “EXO-H3” model from Technaid, Spain. The main mechanical structure is based on aluminum and stainless steel with lightweight construction (~20 kg incl. battery). It has six degrees of freedom on hips, knees, and ankles, actuated by electrical motors with harmonic drive gears. The system can do position, torque, and admittance (stiffness) control. Its proprioceptive sensors comprise joint position, interaction torque, and heel & toe pressure sensors. The control unit can do wired or wireless (Bluetooth, WiFi) communication with CAN protocol.
Drones
Our drone research platform is based on the Pixhawk flight control system together with the MAVROS package to enable MAVLink extendable communication between computers running ROS. Our drone hardware is a quadrotor which consists of frame sizes F260, F450, S500, and Tarot 650. The research focus of our team is autonomous navigation, effective exploration, and intelligent transportation systems for building an autonomous inspection robot system. Additionally, our lab has facilities such as OptiTrack (motion capture camera), RealSense T265 tracking camera, LiDAR Lite, Leddar Vu8 Segmented LiDAR, and FLIR thermal imaging camera Duo R.
Black Mirror
Black Mirror is a stick insect-like robot based on the functional morphology and biomechanics of the Annam stick insect Medauroidea extradentata. We aim to use this robot for studying the neural mechanisms underlying decentralized adaptive neural control. The robot was constructed according to the dimensions of a real stick insect but on a larger scale (approximately seven times larger). It consists of 18 Dynamixel XH540-W270-R servomotors and six foot contact sensors (force sensitive resistor (FSR) sensors). Each motor can deliver 9.9 N.m stall torque and provide several forms of proprioceptive feedback.
Unitree B1: Quadruped Robot
The Unitree B1 robot is a quadruped robot designed for industrial and research applications, offering all-weather operation, high payload capacity, extensive expansion capabilities, multi-dimensional perception, versatile scene adaptability, and powerful computing capabilities. At our lab, the Unitree B1 serves as a versatile research platform, supporting studies in complex locomotion and adaptive robotics.
Freelander (2-Legged Robot)
FreeLander, funded by PTTEP (2020–2021), aims to develop robot motion control technology with high computational efficiency, adaptivity, and versatility, based on the functionality of biological brains combining neural control, online correlation-based learning, forward models, and artificial hormones. The resulting bio-inspired intelligent motion control can apply to different limbed robots (e.g. two, six, eight legs) for adaptive, semi-autonomous, agile, and versatile locomotion in extreme 3D environments (large convex/concave pipes, complex curvature, uneven terrain, etc.), forming a basis for intelligent robotic inspection systems for the oil and gas industry.