The Crystal Robot: Implementation and Demonstration.

Abstract

Effective algorithms for modular self-reconfiguring robots should be distributed and parallel. In previous work, we explored general algorithms for locomotion and self-replication and explained their instantiations to systems in which modules move over the surface of the robot. In this paper, we describe the instantiation of one such locomotion algorithm to the Crystal robot: a distributed locomotion algorithm designed specifically for unit-compressible actuation. We also present the integration of this algorithm with obstacle avoidance for a demonstration at the 2002 AAAI conference.