Jurassic Chicken: An Avian Bipedal Robot 2001 Florida Conference on Recent Advances in Robotics May 10-11, 2001, FAMU-FSU College of Engineering

Jurassic Chicken is a whimsically dubbed Master’s thesis research platform. Based on avian physiology rather than human, this biped robot will eventually use a neural network to provide the dynamic balance required for forward locomotion of an inherently unstable system. Introduction Given that humanoid robots have been a pervasive feature in both speculative and scientific media since the addition of the word “robot” into the American lexicon, it comes as no surprise that the bulk of research conducted on autonomous biped robotics uses a humanoid platform. Humans, however, are not the sole example of successful bipeds. Biped dinosaurs like the Dinonychus (or “velociraptor”) recently popularized by the Jurassic Park movies were agile, successful predators. Modern taxonomy provides us with examples in the Ratite family: large, flightless birds like Struthio camelus, the African ostrich. It was decided, therefore, out of both curiosity and the desire to conduct research that was not simply a recapitulation of work already conducted at a number of laboratories, to base the structure of this biped robot on a Ratite skeleton rather than a human. Background Bipedal locomotion is one of the more challenging control problems in robotics. While it is possible to construct a platform that is statically stable, such platforms tend to be limited in their speed and flexibility. One such example is the Machine Intelligence Lab’s “Orb” [1], a successful biped robot that achieved balance primarily by the use of very large feet in which the bulk of the robot’s weight was concentrated. While Orb was able to walk forward and to turn away from obstacles by means of a shuffling gait, its speed and agility were limited. Agility can be achieved by application of dynamic balancing, in which the robot is constantly falling and catching itself on the next forward stride. The control problem is therefore significantly more complicated than that encountered in static balance. Application of a neural network to handle the control problem is therefore quite appropriate here, given that the issue is to model appropriate compensatory reactions to perturbations in the robot’s balance, based on weighted sensory input. Similar research has, admittedly, been conducted at the MIT Leg Lab on the “Troody” [2] platform, which is based on a troodon dinosaur; however, it was not certain whether MIT’s researchers have yet applied a neural network to the Page 2/5 Jurassic Chicken: An Avian Bipedal Robot Megan Grimm issue of controlling Troody’s locomotion. Theory The bulk of research conducted on bipedal locomotion models a system with a massless leg of variable length (that variable representing the function of knee and ankle flexion and extension), allowing the platform to be modeled as a rigid body of fixed mass. This simplifies the calculations of force and torque required to precipitate motion in a given direction [4]. Accordingly, this platform was designed with minimal weight in the legs, instead concentrating the joint actuators in the body to provide a centralized rigid mass. The center of gravity could then be easily determined, and its placement shifted from between the feet for static stability outside the stable point to induce motion. Platform The Jurassic Chicken biped platform is based on the taxonomy of a Ratite, or flightless bird, rather than on a human. The applicable differences between an avian and a human leg and hip, besides the obvious, are a drastically shortened femur on the part of the avian skeleton and a correspondingly lengthened foot and ankle; from the perspective of a human leg, the avian is walking on its toes. The pelvis of an avian skeleton is also drastically different from that of a human, being both narrower and longer and possessing an extended ischium, as seen in Figure 1 (image courtesy of the Ratite Encyclopedia [6]). The result, in the final version of the Jurassic Chicken, will be to bring the Fig. 1: Ostrich skeleton center of gravity back behind the knees and before the ankles, an effect similar to that of a human standing with knees and ankles flexed. This is actually a very stable configuration and, furthermore, is less prone to overbalancing than a humanoid structure, especially given the extremely low mass of the legs relative to the mass of the body. Figure 2 shows a rough sketch of the robot’s general leg conformation. Because the final version has not been completed, actuator connections and specifics are omitted from the representation. Page 3/5 Jurassic Chicken: An Avian Bipedal Robot Megan Grimm Fig. 2: Jurassic Chicken leg, side view It has long been known that toes are an essential element of bipedal balancing. Accordingly, the Jurassic Chicken’s foot includes three toes: two in front and one in the rear (Figure 3), thus providing compensatory reaction forces should the robot’s balance shift too far either to the front or to the back. This arrangement also provides information regarding the side to which the robot is tilting. Fig. 3: Jurassic Chicken foot, top view The platform’s balance is to be accomplished via input from a two-axis accelerometer mounted on the body and force-sensing resistor films on each toe. The accelerometer is an ADXL202 chip from Analog Devices [5]. Its outputs are duty-cycle-modulated signals that are proportional to the acceleration experienced in the two axes. This acceleration can be calculated as follows: Acceleration (in g) = Duty cycle – duty cycle at 0g Duty cycle per g The output can be PWM decoded by a microcontroller (e.g. the Motorola 68HC11E9 being used here) and used to determine whether the robot is tilting in either the xor y-axis (the z-axis being parallel to the direction of the local gravitational force). The platform also uses force feedback to determine the nature of contact of the feet with the ground surface. Forcesensitive resistor films (Force-Sensitive Resistors from Interlink Electronics [7]) will be placed on the underside of each toe, providing six ground-contact feedback sensors in total. In this way, the direction in which the robot is leaning can be determined, as can the relative force it subsequently applies in order to right itself. Actuator control and sensor interface will be accomplished using the Motorola 68HC11E9 microprocessor. The microcontroller will be directed by a PC104 board running Linux; the final inclusion of this processing hardware (particularly its attendant hard drive and other peripherals) and its power supply will require that the final version of Jurassic Chicken be scaled up considerably from its current twelveinch stature. However, a neural network cannot be supported on a 68HC11, and the ultimate goal of this project is to Page 4/5 Jurassic Chicken: An Avian Bipedal Robot Megan Grimm create a robot which is completely autonomous and untethered, thus requiring that all processing be done onboard.