Test Benches for comparing the performance of an ant's leg with a hexapod robot's Leg

International audienceAnimal-inspired mobile robots tend to show remarkable performance in outdoor locomotion and navigation tasks, but a big gap remains between robots and animals in terms of autonomy and endurance. Biomimicry is helping to solve numerous design issues through a better understanding of how animals move. Insect-inspired robots, in particular, can be built to interact with uneven terrains which are difficult to traverse for other robots, and bio-inspired robots designed to overcome the technological limitations of artificial systems are also valuable models for biologists in better understanding the behavior of animals. Therefore, exploring the limitations caused by mimicking insects of a few millimeters with robots measuring several centimeters becomes relevant. In this study, we first present two test benches used to investigate leg movement: one used to characterize that of an ant and the other that of a robotic leg. By comparing this multiscale data, we discuss the significance and relevance of these measurements in evaluating the robotic performance