Abstract
Jumping is a locomotion strategy widely evolved in both invertebrates and vertebrates. In addition to terrestrial animals, several aquatic animals are also able to jump in their specific environments. In this paper, the state of the art of jumping robots has been systematically analyzed, based on their biological model, including invertebrates (e.g., jumping spiders, locusts, fleas, crickets, cockroaches, froghoppers and leafhoppers), vertebrates (e.g., frogs, galagoes, kangaroos, humans, dogs), as well as aquatic animals (e.g., both invertebrates and vertebrates, such as crabs, water-striders, and dolphins). The strategies adopted by animals and robots to control the jump (e.g., take-off angle, take-off direction, take-off velocity and take-off stability), aerial righting, land buffering, and resetting are concluded and compared. Based on this, the developmental trends of bioinspired jumping robots are predicted.
Highlights
Animals’ locomotion is robust, complex, and adaptive
To make the structure of this review concise and simple, jumping animals have been classified into three subcategories: invertebrates, vertebrate, and aquatic jumping animals and the corresponding bioinspired jumping robots; In vertebrates, and animals jumping in aquatic environments, Section 3, the strategies adopted by jumping animals and robots in controlling take‐off angle, as direction, shown invelocity, Figures and
To make the structure of this review concise and simple, jumping animals have been classified into three subcategories: invertebrates, vertebrates, and animals jumping in aquatic environments, as shown in Figures 2–4, instead, show some examples of jumping animals and jumping robotic artifacts respectively
Summary
Animals’ locomotion is robust, complex, and adaptive. Based on the different environmental scenarios, locomotion can be classified into three categories: (i) terrestrial locomotion; (ii) natural flight;. (ii) Intermittent jumping, mainly adopted by small animals, such as locusts and frogs, that need to reaccumulate energy after landing This energy, in insects ranging from a mass of 1 mg (like fleas) to a mass of 2.5 g (like locusts) is accumulated in highly specialized energy storage components and suddenly released to perform powerful jumps [9]. Jumping robots are indicated for applications characterized by uneven, rough terrain [10], such as battlefield reconnaissance, archaeological exploration, antiterrorism operations, freight transportation, patient care, disaster relief [11] They can be employed in interstellar detection [12], since jumping owes greater advantage over other locomotion modes in low-gravity environments, such as Mars and the moon. Inspired by jumping animals’ performances, researchers developed jumping robots mimicking animals’ strategies to achieve controllable take-off, aerial righting, and landing buffering.
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