Central Pattern Generators (CPGs) have several properties desirable for locomotion: they generate smooth trajectories, are robust to perturbations and simple implement. However, notoriously difficult tune commonly operate in an open-loop manner. This paper proposes a new methodology that allows tuning CPG controllers through gradient-based optimisation Reinforcement Learning (RL) setting. In pa...

Unilateral skipping or bipedal galloping is one of the gait types that humans are able to perform. In contrast to many animals, where gallop is the preferred gait at higher speeds, human bipedal gallop only occurs spontaneously in very specific conditions (e.g. fast downhill locomotion). This study examines the lower limb mechanics and explores the possible reasons why humans do not spontaneous...

The complex interactions among the structural features of axon, its myelin sheath and its length, determine the nature of nerve impulse conduction.. In addition, fibers of different diameters and degree of myelination determine the nerve conduction velocity (NCV). It is therefore, hypothesized that for the same nerve, the NCV may differ in animals, due to the differences in the leg architecture...

Towards advanced bipedal locomotion musculoskeletal system design has received much attention in recent years. It has been recognized that designing and developing new actuators with the properties of the human muscle-tendon complex is only one of the many tasks that have to be ful lled in order to come close to the powerful human musculoskeletal system enabling the human to such versatile dyna...

Walking animals show versatile locomotion. They can also adapt their movement according to changes in their morphology and environmental conditions. These emergent properties are realized by biomechanics, distributed central pattern generators (CPGs), local sensory feedback, and their interactions during body and leg movements through the environment. Based on this concept, a decentralized cont...

The human pelvis plays important functional roles in locomotion and in the birthing of babies. The pelvis acts as a rigid lever during two-legged (bipedal) locomotion, which allows us to stabilize our hip and trunk when body weight is supported on a single leg, and it also operates to effectively transmit body weight from the trunk to the support leg. The pelvis is also important to human birth...

This paper proposes a novel and mechanically decoupled leg and wheel hybrid transformable robot called HyTRo-I that combines two mobility concepts. For example, while wheeled vehicles shares higher speed than legged and tracked machines on a flat ground, they have relatively lower degree of flexibility than the other two on irregular terrain. The HyTRo-I robot evolves three motion modes: wheele...

One of the great ongoing debates in palaeo-anthropology is when, and how, hominids acquired habitual bipedal locomotion. The newly adopted bipedal gait and the ancestral quadrupedal gait are most often considered as very distinct, with each habitual locomotor mode showing corresponding anatomical adaptations. Bonobos (Pan paniscus), along with common chimpanzees (P. troglodytes), are the closes...