Stiquito: Advanced Experiments With A Simple And Inexpensive Robot (i) (w/stiquito Robot Kit)

Description:

This revolutionary new book describes how to build an inexpensive, small-legged robot, and includes the robot kit. The book provides information on the design and control of legged robots and a curriculum for education that presents experiments and projects that illustrates what they teach. The experiments lead the reader on a tour of the current state of research in robotics. Stiquito has also been used to teach in primary, secondary, and high school curricula. The robot is intended for use as a research and educational platform to study computational sensors, subsumption architectures, neural gait control, behavior of social insects, and machine vision. The robot may be powered and controlled through a tether or autonomously with and on-board power supply and electronics.

The book begins with an introduction that describes the birth of Stiquito. The chapters that follow describe the building process, its modifications, and its increased load capacity. Other chapters examine designs for simple controllers to enhance the functionality of the robot and to give the robot intelligence and SCORPIO hardware designs for performing independent, intelligent operations. The text also illustrates Stiquito's uses in education by presenting lab exercises, describing the use of nitinol in classroom experiments, and providing a robotics curriculum for undergraduates. It examines further research on the role of logic in a mobile robot's sensors, control, and locomotion; Stiquito's platform for AI; and simulation of a robot guided by vision. The book concludes with a discussion of the future for nitinol-propelled walking robots.

Table of Contents:

Preface

1. An Introduction to Stiquito, the Book, and the Kit (James M. Conrad).

2. Stiquito: A Small, Simple, Inexpensive Hexapod Robot (Jonathan W. Mills).

3. Building Stiquito II and Tensipede (Jonathan W. Mills).

4. Increasing Stiquito's Loading Capacity (John K. Estell, Thomas A. Owen, and Craig A. Szezublewski).

5. Boris: A Motorless Six-Legged Walking Machine (Roger G. Gilbertson).

6. A PC-Based Controller for Stiquito Robots (Jonathan W. Mills).

7. An M68HC11 Microcontroller-Based Stiquito Controller (James M. Conrad and Mohan Nanjundan).

8. An M68HC11-Based Stiquito Colony Communication System (James M. Conrad, Gregory Lee Evans, and Joyce Ann Binam).

9. A General-Purpose Controller for Stiquito (Shyamsundar Palleto).

10. SCORPIO: Hardware Design (John K. Estell, Timothy A. Muszynski, Thomas A. Owen, Steven R. Snodgrass, Craig A. Szezublewski, and Jason A. Thomas).

11. SCORPIO: Software Design (John K. Estell, Christopher A. Baumgartner, and Quan D. Luong).

12. Lukasiewicz' Insect: The Role of Continuous-Valued Logic in a Mobile Robot's Sensors, Control, and Locomotion (Jonathan W. Mills).

13. Stiquito, a Platform for Artificial Intelligence (Matthew C. Scott).

14. Cooperative Behaviors of Autonomous Mobile Robots (Susan A. Mengel, James M. Conrad, Lance Hankins, and Roger Moore).

15. The Simulation of a Six-Legged Autonomous Robot Guided by Vision (Pauto W.C. Maciet).

16. The Future for Nitinol-Propelled Walking Robots (Mark W. Tilden).

Appendix A: Author Biographies.

Appendix B: An Analog Driver Circuit for Nitinol-Propelled Walking Robots.

Appendix C: Sources of Materials for Stiquito.

Appendix D: Technical Characteristics of Flexinol Actuator Wires.

Index.