Artificial swim by undulating rigid flagellum with joint controllers

Abstract

In this paper, we investigate the locomotion of artificial (robotic) swimmers by an undulating rigid flagellum, whose joints are controlled by actuators. The locomotion of a swimmer with an undulating rigid flagellum inside a two-dimensional channel sandwiched by two non-slip walls is numerically analyzed using the immersed boundary lattice Boltzmann method. Multi-relaxation-time scheme is applied to calculate the flow field under a high Reynolds number (Re). Our numerical results show that the optimal Re exists to maximize the locomotion distance, whereas the direction of locomotion can be reversed in the lower and higher Re limits.