I've been working on bipedal robots for the past ten years
Our focus has been on developing walking and running gates
from scratch, using mathematical principles and have them work well on the robot
This is MABEL So MABEL has one degree-of-freedom hips
the robot is designed to have these very large springs, its legs act like pogo sticks when it runs
These are made out of fiberglass it's the same material you use for making archery bows
Complicated cable connection
that's actually creating a set of differentials
These differential create a motor in series with the spring connected to the legs,
so it bounces up and down like a pogo stick
This is what gives MABEL the ability to step off these very large obstacles
and simply absorb them as a shock absorber would in a car
Or it gives the ability to run with a lilting gate that's very similar to how a human runs
We are sending commands for it to speed up and slow down, but that's about it
The role of the bar is providing side-to-side stability of the robot
It is not holding it up The robot is under independent control here
The fastest walking gate we've achieved is 1.5m/s
which held the bipedal speed record for about four months
The fastest running speed we've achieved is 3m/s,
that's a 9-minute mile, that also set a record
Another record we have, which is dealing with the robustness
of our walking gates, we have robots that can walk blindly
What we envision is
the robot being used in a rescue and disaster situation
There's gonna be lots of debris, dust, lighting is going to be poor, so even if you have a camera
it's not going to give you very accurate ground height information
So you need a robot that can hit objects without tripping and falling
So you see, MABEL is here walking around on a ramp
which suddenly comes to an end
Robot has no idea that it's actually walking up a ramp
So the key thing is, when the robot steps off the platform, it can,
in a millisecond, determine the height of the platform
When you go from a height to a lower height, you've changed potential energy into kinetic energy
You must dissipate all of that, otherwise the robot will slip and fall
That was a 16 1/2 to 18cm height there, [equivalent to] 7 inches
Now it's going for 8 inches, which is 20cm
I think most of us would have broken an ankle at that point
MABEL's feet here
It's really easy to compare the gate that MABEL is executing
versus the gate that of a normal human walking And then you should be asking yourself,
"which one is better?" in all honesty
There goes MABEL
And there goes Ross,
from the Discovery channel
holding the camera
You decide
ATRIAS on the far right
is a new robot we are building It'll be a full 3D walker, meaning that
it will be able to walk completely independently
It'll be battery-powered wireless interface, and you should expect to see it out
on the Lurie Mall
in the upcoming year