Magnetic Repulsion-Based Robot With Diverse Locomotion Capabilities

Locomotion is a fundamental capability that all mobile robots strive to achieve. A large variety of magnetic miniature robots have been proposed to leverage the magnetic forces and torques between internal magnetic agents and external magnetic fields to enable various locomotion on different terrains. However, few of them can achieve diverse locomotion capabilities. And their locomotion capabilities depend on specific environments, which hinders their applicability in the real world. This letter presents a magnetic repulsion-based robot (MR2) with diverse locomotion capabilities, demonstrating agile and robust movement in diverse environments. The MR2 has two embedded free-to-rotate spherical magnets. The local magnetic force between these two magnets is leveraged to generate reciprocating motions with the help of a pair of one-crease linkages. While, the asymmetrical design of MR2 transduces this reciprocating motion into controlled directional locomotion. By tuning the global magnetic field, the MR2 demonstrates non-holonomic mobility and steerability. It can also switch between locomotion modes of crawling, tumbling, and climbing, making it adaptable to diverse terrains and environments. The MR2 demonstrates a robust locomotion capability with a crawling speed of 84.10 mms(-1) (3.50 bodylength/s), a turning speed of 25.2 degrees/s, a tumbling speed of 68.98 mms(-1) (2.87 bodylength/s) and a climbing ability up a slope of 45 degrees.