Micro rubber structure realizing multi-legged passive walking

Abstract

The final goal of this research is to develop functional rubber structures such as friction free rubber, adherent rubber, and shock/ noise absorption rubber, which will work as a flexible rubber robot body, a soft robot skin and a sole of foot. This paper reports the first step of this research on a micro rubber structure realizing multi-legged passive walking, which shows a great potential of realizing friction free or self walking rubber with micro rubber legs. A prototype of the micro rubber structure with many passive legs are designed, fabricated, and tested. The rubber successfully realizes passive walking on a sloping road.