Research of Mammal Bionic Quadruped Robots: a Review

Yibin Li, Bin Li, Jiuhong Ruan and Xuewen Rong, Member, IEEE


Abstract—This paper focuses on the mammal bionic mammal robots can carry much more payload in an efficient
quadruped robots. The main challenge in this field is how to way. The mammal robots with joint actuators have good
design the highly dynamical and high payload quadruped robots. walking speed and transportation power. Consequently, the
This paper firstly introduces the history of bionic quadruped research of bionic robots based on mammal animals becomes an
robots, particularly the landmark quadruped robots. Then the important development direction in robotics field.
state-of-the art of drive mode for quadruped robots is reviewed. Legged robots have been built with one, two, three, four and
Subsequently, the development trend of quadruped robots is possibly more legs. An even number of legs which allows
described. Based on the state-of-the art of quadruped robots, the efficient gaits and stability performance is almost universal [3].
technical difficulties of bionic quadruped robots are briefly Among legged robots, the quadruped robots have good mobility
reviewed. And the hydraulic quadruped robot developed in and stability of locomotion, while the typical biped robots lack
Shandong University is introduced. Finally, the summary and the locomotion stability. The quadruped robot also is a good
future work of the quadruped robots is given. choice from the point of view of a system and controller design.
On the other hand, four legs are less complicated to construct
I. INTRODUCTION and maintain than six ones. Quadruped robots are more
HE need for mobile robots instead of human to work in versatile than wheeled and tracked robots, and more stable than
T some complex and dangerous environments has attracted
more and more attention, such as underground mine,
biped robots. Many researchers and groups have been working
on quadruped robots with biologically inspired locomotion of
nuclear power station, and war against terrorism. Generally, the dynamical gaits, robot balancing skills and the capability of
mobile robots can be classified into three types: air robots, high payload. In general, in order to improve dynamic stability
underwater robots and ground robots. The ground robots are and to increase the walking speed as well as the transportation
developed mostly with tracks or wheels. Although wheeled and power of the quadruped robots, hydraulic actuators with large
tracked robots can work well in even surface, most of them bandwidth and high output power are needed. The robot control
cannot work in uneven surface. In other words, only a portion system, which manages the dynamics of quadruped robot
of the earth’s landmass is accessible for the existing ground behavior, gait generation and transition method also should be
robots. Compared with the wheeled and tracked robots, legged studied and solved in the future.
robots have the potential to walk in a much wider variety of This paper is organized as follows: The history of mammal
terrains just like the fact that biological legged animals can bionic quadruped robots and the development trend of drive
access nearly all of the earth’s land surfaces. For example, the mode are reviewed in Section II. Section III describes the
gazelle has the efficient dynamical locomotion performance development trend of quadruped robots. Then, the technology
even in highly complex environments. Consequently, this difficulties of quadruped robots are analyzed in Section IV. The
potential has motivated a lot of research on legged robots in hydraulic quadruped robot being developed in Shandong
recent years. And legged robots that can go to the places that University in China is introduced in Section V. The last section
animals can now reach should be constructed for real of this paper is the summary and future work of the quadruped
applications. Despite a great number of achievements in robots.
robotics field, legged robots still lag far behind the capabilities II. HISTORY OF MAMMAL QUADRUPED ROBOTS
of their bionics [1, 2].
Legged robots are classified into mammal robots and reptile This section reviews the history of the bionic quadruped
robots based on the mechanical structures. Compared with the robots with joint actuators. We firstly focus on the current
reptilian robots, the mammal robots’ basically vertical leg development of quadruped robots based on bionics of mammal
orientation may be regarded as weight carrying adaptation. The animals. And then the development trend of the drive mode of
quadruped robots, especially the hydraulic actuators which is a
Manuscript received April 20, 2011. This work is supported by the
new-growing drive mode with improved dynamical
Independent Innovation Foundation of Shandong University under grant no. performance and payload capacity, is reviewed in detail in this
2009JC010 and National High-tech R&D Program of China. section.
Yibin Li, Bin Li and Xuewen Rong are with the School of Control Science
and Engineering, Shandong University. A. History of mammal bionic quadruped robots
Bin Li is also with School of Science, Shandong Polytechnic University.
Jiuhong Ruan is with Advanced Vehicle and Robot Institute, Shandong The investigation of quadruped robots is from 20th century
Jiaotong University. 60’s while the study of dynamic locomotion performance for
Yibin Li is corresponding author (E-mail: liyb@ sdu.edu.cn).

978-1-61284-251-6/11/$26.00 
c 2011 IEEE 166
quadruped robots began from the 1980’s. Marc Raibert and his quadruped robots. The quadruped robot Patrush and the
colleagues have made great success in dynamic legged following robots of Tekken series were developed. Among the
locomotion of one, two, four legged robots. Tekken series, the self-contained quadruped robot Tekken II
In the early 1960’s, many scientists and researchers abroad was actuated by electric motors, mechanical springs and
were devoted in researching the legged robots. In 1960, linkage compliance to the joints and could realize dynamic walking
mechanisms included four-bar linkages, cam linkage, using CPGs and reflexes [10]. Kimura also started the research
pantograph mechanisms for locomotion of legged robot was of the quadruped robot “Kotetsu” to challenge the general
proposed by Shigley. The motion of the legs was controlled by a controller for quadruped locomotion with adaptive dynamic
set of double-rocker linkages [4]. In 1966, McGhee and Frank walking using phase modulations based on leg
built quadruped dubbed the “Phoney Pony”. This was the first loading/unloading in 2009 [11].
legged vehicle to walk autonomously under full computer In 1999, Scout II quadruped robot, a dynamically stable
control. Each leg of this quadruped robot had two degrees of running quadruped robot with a very simple mechanical, was
freedom (DOFs) system and performed the simple crawling designed to explore the dynamic gaits of mammal animals by
locomotion as well as the diagonal trot depending on the Martin Buehler at Ambulatory Robotics Lab (ARL) of McGill
selected state diagram. The Phoney Pony robot has great University [12].
significance since it inspired McGhee to build new machines, A bionic quadruped walking robot platform called “Warp1”
which also played an important role in the history of walking for complex terrains has been developed in the Royal Institute
robots: the OSU hexapod and the Adaptive Suspension Vehicle of Technology in Stockholm since 1998. The purpose of the
(ASV) [5]. robot platform is to study the automatically walking in
In the early 1980’s, Marc Raibert of Massachusetts Institute complicated environment and to realize the static and dynamic
of Technology (MIT), and H. Miura and I. Shimoyama of the walking locomotion [13]. The KOLT robot was designed by
University of Tokyo carried out a systemic research on the Kenneth Waldron and his group at Stanford University in
mammal quadruped robot firstly. Marc Raibert built planar and collaboration with Ohio State University in around 2001 [14].
three-dimensional one-legged hopping machines. Based on the Marc Raibert and his colleagues founded Boston Dynamics
Raibert’s three controlling principle of hopping machine, biped Corporation (BDI) in 1992. They restarted the research project
and quadruped robots with prismatic legs which can run and of bionic quadruped robot from 2004. Moreover, the first
jump were subsequently built. This was a milestone of the generation of quadruped robot in 2005 is named as “BigDog”.
motion control of dynamic gaits for quadruped robots [6]. The second generation of BigDog was developed in 2008, as
During 1984-1987, the dynamic walking quadruped robots, shown in Fig. 1. The second generation BigDog is 1m long,
Collie-1 and Collie-2 generations, had been constructed and 0.7m height and weighed about 75 kg. Each leg of the
further studied under the supervision of Professor Miura and quadruped robot had four active degrees of freedom with
Professor Shimoyama in the University of Tokyo. These robots rotational joints powered by hydraulic cylinders and one
could achieve the trotting and pacing dynamic walking gaits passive linear joint in the foot based on the pneumatic spring.
and transition of between trotting and pacing gaits [7]. BigDog is able to walk up and down 30 inclines, trot at speed up
Strictly speaking, although TITAN series quadruped robots to 1.8m/s, carry over 153 kg of payload, walk through forest,
are not belonging to the mammal ones, it is also an important snow, recover balance after sliding on ice or after kicks from the
milestone in the development history of robotics. TITAN III is side [15].
a quadruped robot with three dimensional pantograph
mechanism legs in the TITAN series. It is equipped with
posture sensor and whisker sensors, and is loaded with an
intelligent gait control system for making decisions in terms of
the sensor information and realizing terrain adaptive static walk
[8]. With the further development of quadruped robots, the
four-legged walking machine named “BISAM” was generated
by R. Dillmann and his researching team in Germany. An
adaptive control approach based on coupled neural oscillators
was used to model periodic locomotion of robot BISAM, and
realize a robust control method based on the biologically
inspired adaptive control architecture for achieving
dynamically stable motion in the experimental platform robot Fig. 1. BigDog robot .
BISAM [9]. In December of 2009, BDI has been awarded a contract by
In 1999, based on Central Pattern Generators (CPGs), the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) to
Hiroshi Kimura and his colleagues in Kyoto Institute of develop LS3, the first Legged Squad Support System. LS3 is a
Technology investigated the dynamic walking approach for

2011 IEEE 5th International Conference on Robotics, Automation and Mechatronics (RAM) 167
dynamic robot designed to go anywhere Soldiers and Marines B. The drive mode for quadruped robots
go on foot. Each LS3 will carry up to 400 lbs of gear and
In general, the actuators in robotics include electric,
enough fuel for missions covering 20 miles and lasting 24 hours.
pneumatic and hydraulic actuators.
LS3 will not need a driver, because it will automatically follow
Electric motors are the most common actuators in the field of
a leader using computer vision or travel to designated locations
robotics due to their technological advances and cheapness.
using sensing and GPS. BDI plans for the development to take
Therefore, reduction gears are one of the weakest elements of
30 months, with a working prototype ready by 2012 [16].
an electric motor assembly, and many moving parts of them
On March 1, 2011, with the financial aid of DARPA, BDI
prone to wear. Pneumatic actuators are similar to hydraulic
will also develop cheetah robot. The cheetah robot will have
actuators except for that they use compressed gas to provide
four legs, a flexible spine, an articulated head/neck, and perhaps
pressure instead of liquid. Pneumatic systems respond very
a tail. It will be able to run faster than any existing legged robot
quickly. But the compressibility of air means that precise
or human runner, make tight, zigzagging turns in order to chase
position control of the systems is impossible.
or evade, be able to accelerate very rapidly from a standstill, and
The hydraulic actuators are driven by an oil pressurized fluid
stop just as quickly [17]. This will be a paramount milestone in
of working with high pressures of around 21 MPa (can reach up
the development of robotics if the prototype of cheetah robot is
to 70 MPa in some systems). These results make the hydraulic
fulfilled.
actuators have very high power-to-weight ratios, high
Recently, the researchers of Korea Institute of Industrial
bandwidth, fast response and intrinsic compliance to a certain
Technology and Rotem Company develop a hydraulic actuated
degree [25]. Hydraulic actuators can be very effective for high
quadruped walking robot. All joints of leg of the robot are
power applications.
actuated by hydraulic rotary actuator carry heavy payloads and
In recent years, the hydraulic actuated quadruped robots for
to move fast on uneven terrain. This type robot has achieved the
highly dynamic and heavy payload tasks have been developing
basic trotting gait in even terrain of laboratory environment [18,
by many researchers since their properties are very suitable for
19].
highly dynamic legged robots. BigDog developed by Raibert et
Combining hydraulic with electric actuators, researchers of
al. at Boston Dynamics is the most advanced hydraulic actuated
the Italian Institute of Technology is currently constructing a
quadruped robot [15]. Many other hydraulic quadruped robots
quadruped robot (called HyQ) for performing highly dynamic
are also developed or under development. For example, p2, a
tasks like jumping, hopping and running [20]. So far, the robot
hydraulically driven quadruped robot, is under development to
HyQ just has realized the position control approach of single leg
be used in military environment in Korea [18, 19]. The
with linear hydraulic actuators.
researchers of Italian Institute of Technology are constructing
Besides the development of robot abroad, Sunpei Ma of
HyQ robot with a combination of hydraulic and electric
Shanghai Jiaotong University developed a four legged robot
actuators to perform highly dynamic tasks like jumping,
named JTUWM-III for the first time at the domestic in 1996.
hopping and running [20].
Each leg of JTUWM-III robot has three active joints and a
compliant joint. DC servo motor was used to actuate the each III. DEVELOPING TREND OF QUADRUPED ROBOTS
active joint [21]. The Biobot (biologically inspired robot) was
The developing trend of bionic quadruped robots is mainly
developed by Xiuli Zhang and her colleagues at Tsinghua
driven by the mode of engine-hydraulic actuated power for
University in 2003. She proposed a holosymmetric CPG
improving the power weight ratio and realizing the
topological network based on the improved Matsuoka’s
characteristics of fast response, strong robust stability and long
oscillator model. Furthermore, the rhythmic motion and
range walking ability. The key technologies in environmental
transitions of different gaits were realized. The locomotion
identification of complex terrains, information fusion, gait
ability of Biobot in real environments was improved based on
generation, feedback regulation of position-force, trajectory
the CPG model [22]. In 2006, Xuedong Chen and his
planning of foot and body for quadruped robot and stability
colleagues developed a modular robot called “MiniQuad”
control strategy, etc. should be studied. This development may
which could be reconfigured into variety configurations,
promote the bionic quadruped robots into practical applications.
including quadruped and hexapod configurations for different
The specific development trends are as follows:
tasks by changing the layout of modules [23, 24]. Besides, other
1) Bionic: bionic form and construction, bio-mimetic gaits
quadruped robots also have been developed by some research
After thousands years of evolution, the mammalian animal’s
institutions and universities, including the mammal quadruped
skeletal configurations and gaits have achieved the highest level
robot named TIM1 reported by Institute of Intelligent Machine,
of adaptation to the environments with their unique walking
Chinese Academy of Science, the quadruped robot developed
mode. Therefore, the mammal’s body structure, freedom
by Northwestern Polytechnical University and big quadruped
assignment, and joints configurations are the best references for
robot with electric drives researched by Institute of Automation
the design of bionic legged robots. In order to design bionic
Chinese Academy of Science.
quadruped robots with mammalian animal characteristics of

168 2011 IEEE 5th International Conference on Robotics, Automation and Mechatronics (RAM)
more flexible locomotion, higher power supply and efficiency Based on the research of bionics and bionic technology of
based on the animal’s form, structure and control theory four legged animals, the mechanisms of bionic structure,
becomes an important development trend. different gait generation approaches and methods of restoring
2) Light weight and high payload: high power density drive balance of body in some emergency situations are urgently
device needed to be investigated. The researchers can design the drive
The drive device with high power density, light weight and mechanism and ontology structure for quadruped robots with
high payload is the common key technology in the research area ingenious, large rigidity, light weight and flexible movement
of robotics. Moreover, it is a prerequisite and core technology properties in accord with the modern bionics if this difficulty is
needed to break through for realizing the high dynamic, high resolved. Thus, the technical difficulty is to optimize the
adaptability and high payload capacity of bionic quadruped locomotion mechanism and further accomplish the design of
robots. structure with characteristics of lightweight, impact resistance,
3) High mobility: fast response, high-speed locomotion and powerful obstacle negotiation and good stability.
adaptation to the environment
B. Design and manufacturing technology for the integrated
The new level and inevitable development trend of
hydraulic drive unit with characteristics of high bandwidth,
quadruped robots is to complete working tasks with high
small size and high accuracy
quality in the complex environments. The performance of fast
response and high speed locomotion is a basic condition to deal 1) The design and manufacturing technology for the
with the impact of disturbance of environments and changing hydraulic drive which are united by integrated hydraulic
terrains, especially for complex tasks in field environments. cylinder, servo valve, force/position sensors and digital
Fast walking ability is also a research hotspot and an important controller with characteristics of high pressure, high bandwidth,
task must be resolved for researching high performance high precision, large flow and light weight is a technical
quadruped robots. difficulty.
4) Intelligence: learning, evolution and control 2) The force-position hybrid control technology with
automatically characteristics of high-speed and high-precision is another
The mimicry of humans and biology capable of learning, technical difficulty. Hydraulic servo unit is a system with strong
evolution and decision-making control is very important to non-linear and strong uncertainty characteristics. The
robot intelligence. It is a prerequisite of robots to accommodate time-varying parameters and the variation of load force, speed
the complex environments, complete working tasks and and position have great impact on controlling hydraulic
implement self learning and self evolution. Therefore, it is a pressure of drive system. Therefore, the special hybrid control
significant developing direction and core content for the current algorithm is needed to solve this problem.
and future robot research.
C. Environmental perception and autonomous navigation
5) Man-machine harmonious: man-machine interaction and
security coordination The key problems of realizing environmental perception and
The basic criteria of robotics are to service and subjected to autonomous navigation in robotics are summarized as follows:
mankind, and keep harmonious between man and machine. The heterogeneous source and multi-scale data registration,
development of man-machine interaction technologies in terms calibration and integration problems, semantic expression of
of auditory, vision, gesture, brain’s thinking and other object, environment and eventˈdesign of artificial cognitive
multi-mode perception naturally and friendly is a basic task in system based on intelligence biological cognitive mechanism,
the research of robotics. The purpose of man-machine harmony self alignment integrated navigation algorithms of long time
is to realize the man-machine interaction and security and high precision, passable path planning of complex terrains,
coordination in the future. etc.
IV. TECHNICAL DIFFICULTIES OF QUADRUPED ROBOTS D. Transient compliant generation technology of dynamic
gaits of bionic quadruped robots
A. Mechanical design of robots based on the form and
Under the unstructured circumstances, various kinds of
structural bionics
adaptive gaits should be taken for bionic quadruped robots. The
The first technical difficulty in designing quadruped robots is transient requirement of gait transition is necessary for high
the construction of bionic mechanism. Biological data has been maneuverability. The gait changing stability of posture
used to aid selection of the basic robot physical parameters, transition and locomotion is required for locomotion stability.
such as body length, leg stiffness and hip height. The influence Meanwhile, the gait generation methods and locomotion
of robot physical parameters on key quantities of robot control technologies are difficult to satisfy the requirements
performance, such as actuator effort and payload capability, has mentioned above because of the influences of inertial force,
not been fully explored [26]. impulsive force, impact between foot and ground, interference
of external force, sliding friction and other factors of gaits.

2011 IEEE 5th International Conference on Robotics, Automation and Mechatronics (RAM) 169
 E. The gait planning and dynamic locomotion control The strength check and modal analysis of the hydraulic drive
strategies for quadruped robots in condition of rapid unit system are simulated by ANSYS. The control performance
movement, disturbance from ground and impact from and the optimization of the control parameters are evaluated by
external force, etc the semi-physical simulation system-Dspace. The performance
of the hydraulic drive unit system are as follows: the weight is
The quadruped robot is a serial parallel and highly
less than 2kg, the maximum working stroke of the servo
branched-chain system. The parameters of the robot have large
actuator is at most 60mm, the maximum dynamic force is
time-varying property. The effects of some complicated factors,
700kgf, the maximum working speed is 0.48m/s and the
such as large time varying of parameters, statically unstable
frequency of the servo actuator is much more than 100Hz. The
property for dynamic gaits and instability in the changing
performance of designed hydraulic drive unit system is enough
terrains and impact from external force, bring the research of
for the quadruped robots with dynamic gaits and high power
posture control strategy of stability many serious difficulties.
actuators to carry a considerable payload.
F. The real-time locomotion and rapid perception
technologies for complex terrains based on environmental
perception
One of the main developing goals of bionic quadruped robots
is to realize stability and fast locomotion. Based on the pattern
of environmental perception-modeling-reconstruction and the
control of robot posture stability, target recognition, locomotion Fig. 2. Scheme of the real hydraulic drive unit system.
planning, gait planning and locomotion control subjected to
dynamic constraints and other technology problems should be
mainly solved and tracked. The real time adjusting of posture,
gait, path and energy consumption problems should also be
considered. The final goal is to realize the optimization of
stability, mobility and energy consumption and completion of
given tasks in the complex environments. 1. Piston rod 2. Cylinder 3. Displacement sensor 4, 6. Prssure sensor 5, 7.
Servo valve
G. The system integration method of quadruped robots with
Fig. 3. CAD model of the integrated hydraulic drive unit.
characteristics of high dynamic nature, high mobility and
Based on above hydraulic actuators, an experimental
high payload capability
platform of quadruped robot has been developed in SUCRO,
The bionic quadruped robot with high performance is a which is called “Hanma” (SUCRO Hanma).
highly level integrated platform covered a new bionic The hydraulic drive quadruped robot we developed is shown
mechanism, micro and small power, density driver of high in Fig. 4. The majority of the mechanical structure of the
frequency and high power, high-speed dynamic environments, quadruped robot is constructed by an aluminum alloy due to its
posture perception and high speed real time control. The excellent strength to weight ratio. Its height is 0.67 m in initial
complex integrated technologies of digital hydraulic servo, posture. It is 1 m long and 0.4 m wide. Its weight is 50 kg not
engine, sensors and electrical control system are needed for including hydraulic power source. Linear hydraulic actuators
integration of the platform of quadruped robot. are installed for the quadruped robot to carry heavy payload and
move fast on uneven terrain. One leg module comprises one hip
V. THE QUADRUPED ROBOT DEVELOPING BY SUCRO
joint, one shoulder joint and one knee joint, so the hydraulic
In the development of hydraulic drive quadruped robots, it is quadruped has 12 degrees of freedom, with three degrees of
very important to design the driver actuators and to characterize freedom per leg.
the dynamic gaits.
In 2010, an integrated hydraulic drive unit system designed
for the quadruped being developed in SUCRO (Shandong
University Center for Robotics) and Nanjing Engineering
Institute of Aircraft Systems depicted in Fig. 2 and Fig. 3. The
space borne special devices with high accuracy, large
bandwidth and small characteristic are selected for constructing
the servo valve, displacement sensor and pressure sensor. The
cylinder and servo valve plate are integrated together for
decreasing the weight of the hydraulic drive unit system.
Fig. 4. The real model of the quadruped robot.

170 2011 IEEE 5th International Conference on Robotics, Automation and Mechatronics (RAM)
 We have done experiments with the platform of quadruped [8] K. Yoneda and S. Hirose, “Dynamic and static fusion gait of a quadruped
walking vehicle on a winding path,” IEEE International Conference on
robot in the indoor environment and the walking speed is at
Robotics and Automation. 1992, vol. 1, pp. 143-148.
least 1m/s with the trotting gait. Fig. 5 shows that the quadruped [9] K. Berns, W. Ilg, M. Deck, J. Albiez and R. Dillmann , “Mechanical
robot can move with 80-kg payload in a speed of 0.4m/s. The construction and computer architecture of the four-legged walking
results of the experiments show that the developing robot machine BISAM ,” Mechatronics, IEEE/ASME Transactions on, vol. 4,
no. 1, pp. 32-38, 2002.
platform has sufficient joint actuating power and rigidity.
[10] H. Kimura, Y. Fukuoka and A. H. Cohen, “Adaptive Dynamic Walking of
a Quadruped Robot on Natural Ground based on Biological Concepts,” Int.
Journal of Robotics Research, vol. 26, no. 5, pp. 475-490, 2007.
[11] C. Maufroy, H. Kimura and K. Takase, “ Integration of posture and
rhythmic motion controls in quadrupedal dynamic walking using phase
modulations based on leg loading/unloading,” Autonomous Robots, vol.
28, no. 3, pp. 331-353, 2010.
[12] I. Poulakakis, J. A. Smith, and M. Buehler, “Modeling and Experiments of
Untethered Quadrupedal Running with a Bounding Gait: The Scout II
Robot,” The International Journal of Robotics Research, vol. 24, no. 4, pp.
239-256, 2005.
[13] C. Ridderström, “Legged locomotion: Balance, control and tools -from
Fig. 5. The quadruped robot with 80 kg payload (0.4 m/s).
equation to action,” Ph. D. dissertation, The Royal Inst. of Technology,
VI. SUMMARY AND FUTURE WORK Stockholm, Sweden, May 2003.
[14] J. G. Nichol, S. P. Singh, K. J. Waldron, L. R. Palmer III, and D. E. Orin,
Quadruped robots demonstrate great mobility on different “System design of a quadrupedal galloping machine,” International
Journal of Robotics Research, vol. 23, no. 10-11, pp. 1013-1027, 2004.
terrains and at different speed and gaits. In view of amazing and
[15] M. Raibert, K. Blankespoor, G Nelson, R. Playter and the BidDog Team,
superior performance of BigDog robot and cheetah robot in the “Bigdog, the rough-terrain quaduped robot. In Proc. 17th International
Boston Dynamics, a research boom of hydraulic quadruped Federation of Automation Control, Seoul, Korea, 2008, pp. 10822-10825.
robots has aroused in the robotics field. [16] http://www.bostondynamics.com/robot_ls3.html.
The realization of dynamic stability and airborne hydraulic [17] http://www.gizmag.com/cheetah-robot-to-outrun-any-human/18048/.
[18] H. K. Kim, D. Won, O. Kwon, T. J. Kim, S. S. Kim and S. Park, “Foot
actuator systems is the development trend and technical trajectory generation of hydraulic quadruped robots on uneven terrain,” In
difficulty for bionic quadruped robots. Over the last five Proc. 17th International Federation of Automation Control, Seoul, Korea,
decades, quadruped robots have become faster, more efficient, 2008, pp. 3021-3026.
more robust, and have a considerable payload capability. With [19] T. J. Kim, B. So, O. Kwon and S. Park, “The energy minimization
algorithm using foot rotation for hydraulic actuated quadruped walking
the development of robotics, the intelligence bionic quadruped robot with redundancy,” In Proc. 41st International Symposium on
robots of adaptive ability of field environments with highly Robotics and 6th German Conference on Robotics, Munich,
dynamics, fast speed and more payload capability will be Germany,2010, pp. 786-791.
constructed in the recent future. [20] C. Semini, “HyQ- Design and Development of a Hydraulically Actuated
Quadruped Robot,” Ph. D. dissertation, Italian Institute of Technology and
Compared with foreign advanced technology, the robotics of University of Genoa, 2010.
China is relatively backward and need to carry out relative [21] D. Q. He, Y. C. Liu, P. S. Ma, “Research on influence of joint reactions on
research as soon as possible. We should make some stability of quadruped machine walking in trot gait,” proceedings of the
breakthroughs in some common key techniques in order to Intelligent Control and Automation, 2008 WCICA 2008 7th World
Congress on, Chongqing, 2008, pp. 4870-4875.
promote the fast development of robotics and satisfy various [22] X. L. Zhang, H. J. Zheng, L. F. Chen, “Gait transition for a quadrupedal
requirements including national defense construction and robot by replacing the gait matrix of a central pattern generator model,”
others in China. Advanced Robotics, vol. 20, no. 7, pp. 849-866, 2006.
[23] Y. Sun, X. D. Chen, T. H.Yan, W. C. Jia, “Modules Design of a
REFERENCES Reconfigurable Multi-Legged Walking Robot,” In Proc. IEEE
International Conference on Robotics and Biomimetics, Kunming, 2006,
[1] J. Z. Kolter, M. P. Rodgers and A.Y. Ng, “A control architecture for
pp. 1444-1449.
quadruped locomotion over rough terraiQ,” IEEE International
[24] X. D. Chen, Y. Sun and W. C. Jia, Motion Planning and Control of
Conference on Robotics and Automation, Pasadena, 2008, pp. 811-818. Multilegged Walking Robots. Wuhan, China: HUST Press, 2006.
[2] M. H. Raibert , “Legged robots,” Communications of the ACM, vol. 29, [25] C. Semini, N. G. Tsagarakis, E. Guglielmino and D. G. Caldwell, “Design
no. 6, pp. 499-514, 1986. and experimental evaluation of the hydraulically actuated prototype leg of
[3] D. J. Todd, Walking machines: an introduction to legged robots. London: the HyQ robot,” The 2010 IEEE/RSJ International confercence on
Kogan Page, 1985. pp. 68-69. Intelligent Robot and Systems, Taipei, Taiwan, 2010, pp. 3640-3645.
[4] S. M. Song and K. J. Waldron, Machine That Walk-The Adaptive [26] P. Chatazkos and E. Papadopoulos, “Bio-inspired design of
Suspension Vehicle. The MIT Press, 1989, pp. 12-13. electrically-driven bounding quadrupeds via parametric analysis,”
[5] P. Gonzalez-de Santos, E. Garcia and J. Estremera, Quadrupedal Mechanism and Machine Theory, vol. 44, no. 3, pp. 559-579, 2009.
Locomaotion: An Introduction to the Control of Four-legged Robot.
London: Springer-Verlag, 2006, pp. 9-10.
[6] M. H. Raibert, legged Robot That Balance. The MIT Press, 1986, ch. 4.
[7] H. Kimura, I. Shimoyama and H. Miura, “Dynamics in the dynamic walk
of a quadruped robot,” Advanced Robotics, vol. 4, no. 3, pp. 283-301,
1990.

2011 IEEE 5th International Conference on Robotics, Automation and Mechatronics (RAM) 171