"It's stunning. I have never seen a machine doing a motion like this." - Jessy Grizzle, a professor in the Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science.
MABEL is a pi-pedal robot that looks like it is from the future. Its run invokes images of it chasing down people who do not conform to the system. Of if you are less pessimistic about the future, perhaps it is running into a fire to save someone. The robot is not doing either yet, but it has demonstrated the first human-like gate that can walk and run.
Originally built in 2008 at the Robotics Institute at Carnegie Mellon University by Jonathan Hurst and University of Michigan professor Jessy Grizzle. Since then, professor Grizzle and students Koushil Sreenath and Hae-Won Park have spent their time tweaking the movement and feedback algorithm to help keep its balance while it adapts to the surface.
MABEL spends 40% of its running stride in the air completely, much like a real human runner. No other running bot has achieved this feat. The resulting maximum speed is 6.8 miles per hour (11 km per hour). The team proclaims MABEL, "the world's fastest bi-pedal robot with knees." Their work continues on improving the bot's speed and movement.
Again the banner of "search and rescue" has been waved for MABEL's further development. Professor Grizzle paint's the picture, "The robotics community has been trying to come up with machines that can go places where humans can go, so a human morphology is important. If you would like to send in robots to search for people when a house is on fire, it probably needs to be able to go up and down stairs, step over the baby's toys on the floor, and maneuver in an environment where wheels and tracks may not be appropriate."
Original developer Hurst continues the thought, "We envision some extraordinary potential applications for legged robot research: exoskeletons that enable wheelchair-bound people to walk again or that give rescuers super-human abilities, and powered prosthetic limbs that behave like their biological counterparts."
Eavesdropper
MABEL is funded by the Defense Advancment Research Project Agency and the National Science Foundation.