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蛇形机器人有朝一日将能够在废物处理装置中蜿蜒前进,检查是否有泄漏的危险品;或者在坍塌的建筑物中缓慢爬行,利用随身携带的照相机和麦克风寻找幸存者。几年前,美国安阿伯密歇根大学的机器人专家 Johann Borenstein 和他的同事设计出了这种蛇形机器人的原型,并将它命名为 Omni Tread。这种1.2米长的机械能够利用身上的传送带像蛇一样缓慢地爬行,这些传送带覆盖了机器人表面积的80%,并且能够进行强有力的弯曲,而这都要感谢这部机械上安装的4个充气关节。在3月份出版的《工业机器人》杂志上,研究小组报告了在不同地形上实验这种蛇形机器人的结果。据 Borenstein 介绍,Omni Tread 能够穿越或者跨过大部分机器人无法通过的障碍物。
Snake robots will someday be able to wind its way through waste disposal installations to check for leaks of dangerous goods or crawl slowly in collapsed buildings to find survivors with hand-held cameras and microphones. A few years ago Johann Borenstein, a robotics expert at the University of Ann Arbor in the United States, and his colleagues devised a prototype of this serpentine robot and named it Omni Tread. This 1.2-meter-long machine can crawl slowly like a snake with its conveyor belts that cover 80% of the surface area of the robot and are capable of strong bending, all thanks to the four mechanically installed Inflatable joints. In the March issue of Industrial Robot magazine, the team reported on the results of experimenting with such serpentine robots on different topographies. According to Borenstein, the Omni Tread can traverse or cross obstacles that most robots can not pass through.