This Robot Looks Like a Pancake and Jumps Like a Maggot能持續(xù)跳躍的扁平無(wú)腿機(jī)器人

薩布麗娜·伊布勒 云天

Researchers designed a soft， legless robot that can hop and navigate obstacle courses. 研究人員設(shè)計(jì)了一種可以跳躍和繞過(guò)障礙物的無(wú)腿軟體機(jī)器人。

If a pancake could dream， it might long for legs so it could jump off your breakfast plate in pursuit of a better， unchewed life.

But legs， it turns out， are not necessary for something as flat as a flapjack to hop around. A group of scientists has designed a tortilla-shaped robot that can jump several times per second and higher than seven times its body height of half a centimeter. They report that the robot， which is the size of a squished1 tennis ball and weighs about the same as a paper clip， nimbly2 performs these feats without any semblance3 of feet.

Shuguang Li， a roboticist at Harvard who was not involved with the research， called the new robot “a clever idea” and “an important contribution to the soft robotics.”

Many terrestrial4 robots， meaning ones at home on the ground rather than in air or water， move by rolling or walking. But the ability to jump can help a terrestrial robot traverse5 new spaces and navigate rough terrain; sometimes its more efficient for a robot to jump over an obstacle than to go around it， Rui Chen， a researcher at Chongqing University in China and an author of the paper， wrote in an email.

Although jumping can offer some robots a competitive edge， engineering that ability has been a challenge for robotics researchers. Some soft robots that store energy can perform a single， impressive jump very infrequently. Some lightweight soft robots that do not store energy can hop about very frequently but cannot jump high or far enough to successfully cross an obstacle like a curb6.

The ideal jumping robot would be able to frequently jump high and far. But “these two pursuits are contradictory，” Dr. Chen said. Jumping higher or farther requires more energy， and jumping more frequently requires that energy to be accumulated and released over a shorter period of time—a tall task for a tiny robot.

For inspiration， the researchers looked to gall midge larvae， maggots that miraculously hurl themselves across distances 30 times as long as their loglike bodies， which are one-tenth of an inch long. “Most creatures need feet to jump，” Dr. Chen said， adding that the larvae “can leap by the bending of their bodies.” The maggot squishes itself into the shape of a ring—sticking its head to its rear with special sticky hairs—and squeezes fluid toward one end of its body， making it rigid. The accumulation of fluid builds up pressure， and releasing the pressure sends the maggot soaring.

The robots disklike body does not resemble that of a gall midge larva， but it jumps like one. Its body is made of two plastic pouches printed with electrodes7; the front pouch is filled with liquid and the rear is filled with the same volume of air. The robot uses static electricity to drive the flow of liquid to deform parts of its body， which causes the body to bend and generate force with the ground， resulting in a jump. And the air pouch mimics the function of an animals tail， helping the robot maintain a stable position while jumping and landing.

This design allows the robot to jump 7.68 times its body height and have a continuous jumping speed of six body lengths per second—a speed that Dr. Li called “very impressive.”

So the robot could jump rapidly and continuously. But could it cross obs-tacles？ To find out， the researchers put the tiny robot through numerous tests perhaps as deserving of an inspirational movie montage8 as Sylvester Stallones training in “Rocky9.”

The robot had to cross various gravel mounds， slopes and wires. It had to jump across a round step five milli-? meters tall and traverse an empty ring eight millimeters tall—monumental barriers for a four-millimeter-tall robot with a body like a pancake. The amateur acrobat passed all of these tests easily， if not gracefully.

The robot can also change directions on its own， around 138 degrees per second—the fastest turning speed of any soft jumping robot， Dr. Chen said. Much like a car， the robot can steer itself by continuously turning， according to Wenqi Hu， a senior research scientist at the Max Planck Institute in Germany who was not involved with the research.

The robot relies on external power that is fed through electrical wires. The researchers would like to make the robot wireless in future iterations10， but it will be a challenge to keep the robot tiny and lightweight， Dr. Chen said.

“I wonder if adding an onboard power source would be a challenge for this tiny soft jumper，” Dr. Li said.

The researchers propose integrating sensors into the tiny robot to allow it to detect environmental conditions， such as pollutants in buildings. Dr. Li suggested that the robot could eventually inspect hard-to-reach areas of large industrial machines or， if equipped with a small camera， be used on search-and-rescue missions for trapped people or animals， as it can travel through small spaces in disaster areas. And， he added， the robot is tiny and cheap. “It would probably cost only a few dollars to build one，” Dr. Li said.

Although the robot is currently confined to Earth， Dr. Hu suggested it might be right at home11 exploring another planet. “This type of task requires a simple but robust miniature robot design” that is lightweight enough to be carried to new worlds， Dr. Hu said， adding that the materials needed to build this robot would need to survive and function in extraterrestrial environments.

If this is true， the researchers robot might jump over dusty rocks and craters on the moon or Mars， going where no pancake has gone before.

如果一個(gè)早餐煎餅也能做夢(mèng)的話，長(zhǎng)出雙腿可能是它渴求的夢(mèng)想。這樣它就可以從你的早餐盤(pán)上跳下來(lái)，以逃離被咀嚼的命運(yùn)。

但事實(shí)證明，對(duì)于像煎餅一樣扁平的東西來(lái)說(shuō)，腿并不是跳來(lái)跳去的必要條件。一組科學(xué)家設(shè)計(jì)了一種煎餅形狀的機(jī)器人，每秒可以跳躍數(shù)次，高度是其半厘米身高的七倍還多。報(bào)告指出，這個(gè)大小相當(dāng)于一個(gè)被壓壞的網(wǎng)球、重量與回形針差不多的機(jī)器人，沒(méi)有雙腳卻可以靈活地完成這些壯舉。

未參與此研究的哈佛大學(xué)機(jī)器人專家李曙光稱，這種新型機(jī)器人是“一種奇思妙想”，“對(duì)軟體機(jī)器人學(xué)做出了重要貢獻(xiàn)”。

陸地機(jī)器人（即在家中的地面上而非空中或水中活動(dòng)的機(jī)器人）大多通過(guò)滾動(dòng)或行走來(lái)移動(dòng)，但是跳躍的能力可以幫助地面機(jī)器人穿越新的空間并在崎嶇的地形中確定行進(jìn)方向。該論文的一位作者、中國(guó)重慶大學(xué)研究人員陳銳在一封電子郵件中稱：對(duì)機(jī)器人來(lái)說(shuō)，有時(shí)躍過(guò)障礙要比繞過(guò)障礙更高效。

雖然跳躍可以為一些機(jī)器人提供競(jìng)爭(zhēng)優(yōu)勢(shì)，賦予機(jī)器人這種能力對(duì)機(jī)器人研究人員來(lái)說(shuō)卻是一個(gè)挑戰(zhàn)。儲(chǔ)能軟體機(jī)器人可以進(jìn)行強(qiáng)勁的跳躍，但頻率很低;不儲(chǔ)能的輕型軟體機(jī)器人可以頻繁地跳來(lái)跳去，但不能跳得足夠高、足夠遠(yuǎn)，從而成功越過(guò)路緣之類的障礙物。

理想的跳躍機(jī)器人能持續(xù)跳躍且跳得又高又遠(yuǎn)，但陳博士說(shuō)“這兩個(gè)目標(biāo)是矛盾的”。跳得更高更遠(yuǎn)需要更多的能量，而持續(xù)跳躍則要求能量在較短時(shí)間內(nèi)積累和釋放：對(duì)于一個(gè)微型機(jī)器人來(lái)說(shuō)，這是一項(xiàng)艱巨的任務(wù)。

為了獲得靈感，研究人員研究了癭蚊幼蟲(chóng)——這種蛆蟲(chóng)身體呈原木狀、體長(zhǎng)十分之一英寸，卻能奇跡般地跳出30倍于體長(zhǎng)的距離?！按蠖鄶?shù)生物需要腳才能跳躍，”陳博士說(shuō)，這種幼蟲(chóng)“可通過(guò)彎曲身體來(lái)跳躍”。蛆蟲(chóng)將自己擠壓成環(huán)形，用特殊的黏性毛發(fā)將頭部黏在尾部并將液體擠壓到身體的一端，使其變得僵硬。液體的積累會(huì)積聚壓力，壓力釋放，蛆蟲(chóng)就會(huì)躍起。

機(jī)器人的盤(pán)狀外形不似癭蚊幼蟲(chóng)，但它們的跳躍方式如出一轍。它的主體由兩個(gè)印有電極的塑料袋制成;前袋裝滿液體，后袋裝滿相同體積的空氣。機(jī)器人利用靜電驅(qū)動(dòng)液體流動(dòng)，使其身體某些部位彎曲并與地面產(chǎn)生反作用力，從而進(jìn)行跳躍;裝有空氣的袋子則模仿了動(dòng)物尾巴的功能，幫助機(jī)器人在跳躍和著陸時(shí)保持姿態(tài)穩(wěn)定。

這種設(shè)計(jì)使機(jī)器人能跳到自身身高的7.68倍高度，每秒能持續(xù)跳躍體長(zhǎng)的6倍距離。李博士稱這一速度“十分了不起”。

機(jī)器人可以快速且持續(xù)地跳躍了。但它能跨越障礙嗎？為了找到答案，研究人員對(duì)這個(gè)微型機(jī)器人進(jìn)行了無(wú)數(shù)次測(cè)試——也許應(yīng)該用蒙太奇手法剪輯一組鼓舞人心的電影畫(huà)面，就像西爾維斯特·史泰龍?jiān)凇堵迤妗分械挠?xùn)練一樣。

機(jī)器人需要穿過(guò)各種礫石堆、斜坡和電線。它得跳過(guò)一個(gè)五毫米高的圓形臺(tái)階，穿過(guò)一個(gè)八毫米高的空環(huán)——對(duì)于一個(gè)四毫米高、身體如煎餅般的機(jī)器人來(lái)說(shuō)，這些是巨大的障礙;而業(yè)余雜技演員即使動(dòng)作不優(yōu)雅，也很容易通過(guò)以上的全部測(cè)試。

據(jù)陳博士所言，機(jī)器人也可以自己改變方向，大約每秒138度——這是軟體跳躍機(jī)器人的最快轉(zhuǎn)彎速度。德國(guó)馬克斯·普朗克研究所的高級(jí)研究員胡文奇未參與此研究，他表示，機(jī)器人可以像汽車一樣通過(guò)不斷轉(zhuǎn)彎來(lái)操縱自己。

機(jī)器人依賴通過(guò)電線輸送的外部電源。據(jù)陳博士所言，研究人員希望在未來(lái)的迭代中使機(jī)器人無(wú)線化，但保持機(jī)器人小巧輕便將是一個(gè)挑戰(zhàn)。

李博士則表示：“我想知道，對(duì)于這個(gè)小小的軟體跳躍機(jī)器人來(lái)說(shuō)，增加一個(gè)機(jī)載電源是否會(huì)是一個(gè)挑戰(zhàn)。”

研究人員建議將傳感器集成到微型機(jī)器人中，以使其能夠檢測(cè)環(huán)境因素，例如建筑物中的污染物。李博士認(rèn)為，該機(jī)器人最終可以用于檢查大型工業(yè)機(jī)器里難以夠到的區(qū)域，如果配備了小型攝像頭還可用于被困人員或動(dòng)物的搜救，因?yàn)樗茉跒?zāi)區(qū)的狹小空間中行進(jìn)。而且， 這種機(jī)器人很小、很便宜。“制作一個(gè)可能只需要幾美元?！彼a(bǔ)充說(shuō)。

雖然此種機(jī)器人目前只能用于地球上，但胡博士認(rèn)為，它有可能勝任探索其他星球。他說(shuō)，“這類任務(wù)需要一種簡(jiǎn)單但堅(jiān)固的微型機(jī)器人款式”，其設(shè)計(jì)要足夠輕巧以便帶到新星球，并補(bǔ)充表示，建造這種機(jī)器人所需的材料要能適應(yīng)外星環(huán)境，并在該環(huán)境中正常運(yùn)作。

倘若這能成真，研制的機(jī)器人可能會(huì)躍過(guò)月球或火星上布滿灰塵的巖石和隕石坑，去到從未有煎餅涉足的地方。

（譯者為“《英語(yǔ)世界》杯”翻譯大賽獲獎(jiǎng)?wù)撸?/p>

1 squish壓扁，擠扁。? 2 nimbly敏捷地;靈巧地。? 3 semblance表象，外觀。

4 terrestrial地面的，陸地的。? 5 traverse穿過(guò);橫穿。? 6 = kerb〈英〉（道路的）路緣。

7 electrode電極。

8 montage〈法語(yǔ)〉蒙太奇，原為建筑學(xué)術(shù)語(yǔ)，意為構(gòu)成、裝配，現(xiàn)多指一種電影剪輯技術(shù)，是電影創(chuàng)作的主要敘述手段和表現(xiàn)手段之一。蒙太奇相對(duì)于長(zhǎng)鏡頭電影表達(dá)方法，它通過(guò)將一系列不同地點(diǎn)、不同距離、不同角度、不同方法拍攝的短鏡頭組合使用來(lái)編輯成一部有情節(jié)的電影。? 9《洛奇》講述了一名拳擊手（西爾維斯特·史泰龍飾）為爭(zhēng)奪拳王不懈練習(xí)的故事，電影中多次運(yùn)用了蒙太奇的表現(xiàn)手法。? 10 iteration迭代。