Autonomous robotic locomotion investigates how robots perceive, plan, and execute movement in complex, often unstructured environments with minimal human intervention. Work in this area spans legged, wheeled, aerial, amphibious, and soft robots, emphasizing bio-inspired control strategies, neuromechanics, and learning-based methods for gait adaptation, trajectory modulation, and slip prevention. Research also addresses navigation and mapping, kinematic and impedance control, and human–robot collaboration, enabling robots to perform tasks such as construction, waste collection, manipulation, and agile behaviors like parkour, badminton, and swarm-based assembly.
Robotics
Roboticists have struggled to get humanoid robots to effectively replicate athletic sports skills, such as those needed for tennis. These sports require highly dynamic motion, quick reactions, and high precision that robots ...
Robotics
Sheepdogs, bred to control large groups of sheep in open fields, have demonstrated their skills in competitions dating back to the 1870s. In these contests, a handler directs a trained dog with whistle signals to guide a ...
Mar 18, 2026
0
23
Robotics
For the first time, researchers at Leipzig University have shown that tiny synthetic microswimmers can perceive their surroundings directly through their own body shape and autonomously adapt to rapidly changing fluid flows. ...
Mar 17, 2026
0
12
Robotics
Whether in the kitchen or on a workshop floor, robot assistants that can fetch items for people could be extremely useful. Now, a team of Brown University researchers has developed a way of making robots better at figuring ...
Mar 13, 2026
0
18
Robotics
A robot that can locate lost items on command, the latest development at the Technical University of Munich (TUM), combines knowledge from the internet with a spatial map of its surroundings to efficiently find the objects ...
Mar 12, 2026
0
27
Business
A robot task AI capable of learning and performing everyday repetitive tasks in a human-like manner has been developed. The AI learns tasks through human demonstrations and executes complex tasks step by step based on a hierarchical ...
Mar 12, 2026
0
16
Engineering
When natural disasters or extreme weather events hit, delivering aid quickly and efficiently to those affected is crucial. Humanitarian relief efforts commonly rely on the combination of trucks and drones as a "tag team" ...
Mar 12, 2026
0
12
Robotics
Experienced human cyclists can perform a wide range of maneuvers and acrobatics while riding their bicycle, from balancing in place to riding on a single wheel or hopping over obstacles. Reproducing these agile maneuvers ...
Automotive
So-called "driverless" cars often have human operators remotely controlling the vehicles to help navigate tricky driving situations and avoid accidents. But this setup poses a number of challenges. How do you ensure the operators ...
Mar 11, 2026
0
21
Robotics
MIT researchers have developed a generative artificial intelligence-driven approach for planning long-term visual tasks, like robot navigation, that is about twice as effective as some existing techniques. Their method uses ...
Mar 11, 2026
0
24
