Science Fiction
Dictionary
A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z
 |
'Air Hopper' Robot Grasshopper
This Air Hopper robot is a prototype created at the Tokyo Institute of Technology. The intent is to create a robot that is able to handle difficult, uneven terrain with some measure of robotic aplomb.
(Air Hopper )
The Air Hopper uses an air cylinder to achieve some height; it can apparently jump as much as 70 centimeters forward and 40 centimeters high. As shown above, the Air Hopper 129cm long, stands 52.2cm tall and weighs 32.4kg.
DARPA is also working on a hopping robot - the precision urban hopper.
The only hopping robot that I can recall in science fiction is quite different in structure. I'm thinking of 1994 novel Heavy Weather; Bruce Sterling wrote about a device called a "dope mule robot:"
It was crossing the hills with vast, unerring, twenty-meter leaps. A squat metal sphere, painted in ragged patches of dun and olive drab. It had a single thick, pistoning metal leg...
Here are some jumping leaping robot links. Hop to it!
- Jollbot Robot Ball Jumps, Bounces And Rolls
Jollbot presents a unique solution to the problem of navigating rough terrain here on Earth - and on other planets. With video. - Prototype Jockey-Ridden Hopping Robot
Expensive and uncooperative animals to be phased out in favor of hopping robots. With video. - Hopping Robot Sets Record
Watch the "grasshopper robot" do its stuff in the video.
Scroll down for more stories in the same category. (Story submitted 9/19/2010)
Follow this kind of news @Technovelgy.| Email | RSS | Blog It | Stumble | del.icio.us | Digg | Reddit |
Would
you like to contribute a story tip?
It's easy:
Get the URL of the story, and the related sf author, and add
it here.
Comment/Join discussion ( 0 )
Related News Stories - (" Robotics ")
Unitree CEO Wang Xingxing Runs With His G1 Robot Army
'Does thinking you're the last sane man on the face of the Earth make you crazy?'
Blue Collar AI Goes To Work To Mine Its Own Crypto
Blue collar bot.
HandelBot Helps Two-Handed Robots Learn Piano
'I request that you feed the correlation between those dots and the levers of the panel into my memory banks.'
Woven Fiber Electronic Skin For Robots
'... all the feel and appearance of human flesh and epidermis.' - Harl Vincent, 1934.
Technovelgy (that's tech-novel-gee!) is devoted to the creative science inventions and ideas of sf authors. Look for the Invention Category that interests you, the Glossary, the Invention Timeline, or see what's New.
Science Fiction
Timeline
1600-1899
1900-1939
1940's 1950's
1960's 1970's
1980's 1990's
2000's 2010's
Current News
Grok And The City Fathers From 'Cities In Flight' By James Blish
'Chris, the City Fathers are not interested in your welfare; I suppose you know that. They're interested in only one thing: the survival of the city.'
Why Not Move A Warehouse District?
'Did you never see a moving house before?'
Will An AI Found A New Religion?
'You must decide how you will worship Me.'
Terraformer Industries Make Methane
'Drake was the young spatial engineer he employed to terraform the little rock...'
I Need An Outdoor Spherical Display
'Usually a spherical display hovered in the centre...'
Worm Disrupts Physics Simulations Undetected For A Decade
'It diverts integers of the data, the fundamental message-units, so that they no longer agree.'
Muxcard Redditor's DIY Credit Card-Sized Computer
It's a computer, but just barely.
'Soft Assembly' Fashions That Fashion Themselves On The Wearer
'Clothes are no longer made from dead fibers of fixed color and texture that can approximate only crudely to the vagrant human figure...'
Orwell's Nightmare Of AI-Written Novels Comes To Pass
'Books were just a commodity that had to be produced, like jam or bootlaces.'
ISS Plagued By Leak - Again!
'There were perhaps a dozen bladder-like objects in the tunnel...'
Ridiculous 'Ghost Murmur' Tech Still Science Fiction
'...it rears and spreads its fan. It can pick one man out of a crowd.'
Outdoor Video Screens Can Be Arbitrarily Large
The Shape of Things To Come
Infrared Contact Lenses To See In The Dark
'I can see in the dark, Case.'
What'll You Have? Extinct Animals Returned, Or Synthetic Eggshells?
'...a new plastic with the characteristics of an avian eggshell.'
Sunbird Pulsar Fusion Like Leinster's Space Tug
'It was a pushpot, which could not possibly be called a jet plane because it could not possibly fly. Only it did.'
RentAHuman App Lets AI Agents Hire Humans
'She wouldn't stop until Antar had told her everything he knew about whatever it was that she was playing with on her screen.'
