Jumping insects such as fleas, froghoppers, grasshoppers, and locusts take off from the ground using a catapult mechanism to push their legs against the surface of the ground while using their pairs of flapping wings to propel them into the air. Such...
We report on the development and analysis of a new torque-actuated dissipative spring loaded inverted pendulum model with rolling contact (TDR-SLIP), which is a successor to the previously developed spring loaded inverted pendulum model with rolling ...
The tailless flapping-wing micro air vehicle (FW-MAV) is one of the most challenging problems in flapping-wing design due to its lack of tail for inherent flight stability. It must be designed in such a way that it can produce proper augmented contro...
Fixed-wing small, unmanned aerial vehicles usually fly in atmospheric boundary layers that are often under the influence of turbulent environments. Inspired by nature's flyers, an application of an energy-harvesting flight strategy for increasing the...
Achieving atmospheric flight on Mars is challenging due to the low density of the Martian atmosphere. Aerodynamic forces are proportional to the atmospheric density, which limits the use of conventional aircraft designs on Mars. Here, we show using n...
This study reports the first ever demonstration of the aero navigation of a free-flying insect based on feedback control. Instead of imitating the complicated kinetics and mechanisms of insect locomotion, a live insect can be directly transformed int...
Studies on wing kinematics indicate that flapping insect wings operate at higher angles of attack (AoAs) than conventional rotary wings. Thus, effectively flying an insect-like flapping-wing micro air vehicle (FW-MAV) requires appropriate wing design...
For centuries, designers and engineers have looked to biology for inspiration. Biologically inspired robots are just one example of the application of knowledge of the natural world to engineering problems. However, recent work by biologists and inte...
Bio-inspired robotics is a promising design strategy for mobile robots. Jumping is an energy efficient locomotion gait for traversing difficult terrain. Inspired by the jumping and flying behavior of the desert locust, we have recently developed a mi...
We describe and explain new advancements in the design of the aerodynamic force platform, a novel instrument that can directly measure the aerodynamic forces generated by freely flying animals and robots. Such in vivo recordings are essential to bett...
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