R. David Edmunds

Papers

Total Citations

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About

R. David Edmunds is a pioneering roboticist whose research focuses on the design, control, and locomotion of tensegrity robots—lightweight, compliant structures composed of rigid rods and elastic cables. His major contributions lie in advancing the mobility of spherical tensegrity robots, particularly on challenging terrains. In his highly cited 2017 paper (41 citations), Edmunds introduced a novel teleoperated spherical tensegrity robot capable of climbing steep inclined surfaces through a multi-cable actuation scheme, demonstrating robust hardware performance. He further pushed the boundaries of autonomous control in his 2018 work (35 citations), where he applied deep reinforcement learning to enable tensegrity robot locomotion under limited sensory inputs—a critical step toward their use in space exploration, where nonlinear dynamics and high-dimensional control pose significant challenges. Edmunds’ work has been instrumental in bridging the gap between tensegrity theory and practical, real-world robotic locomotion. His achievements highlight the potential of these unique robots for planetary exploration and other extreme environments, earning him recognition as a leading voice in soft and compliant robotics.