A Tread/Limb/Serpentine Hybrid Robot: Toward Hypermobility in Deconstructed Environments

According to the Red Cross, an average of over 600 disasters and 100,000 associated deaths occur annually throughout the world. This frequency of disasters strains an already overburdened disaster response effort. In the first 48 hours of a rescue operation, it is estimated that a responder will get less than three hours of continuous sleep as they need to work at full force to set up the operation and begin work in the field. This leads to sleep deprivation during the most critical time for search and rescue of victims. Therefore, robots are greatly needed as a force multiplier in USAR response to reduce some of the burden and workload placed on the human rescue workers to make for a more efficient and effective response

Mechatronic Systems

Mechatronics, the synergistic blend of mechanics, electronics, and computer science, has evolved over the past twenty five years, leading to a novel stage of engineering design. By integrating the best design practices with the most advanced technologies, mechatronics aims at realizing high-quality products, guaranteeing at the same time a substantial reduction of time and costs of manufacturing. Mechatronic systems are manifold and range from machine components, motion generators, and power producing machines to more complex devices, such as robotic systems and transportation vehicles. With its twenty chapters, which collect contributions from many researchers worldwide, this book provides an excellent survey of recent work in the field of mechatronics with applications in various fields, like robotics, medical and assistive technology, human-machine interaction, unmanned vehicles, manufacturing, and education. We would like to thank all the authors who have invested a great deal of time to write such interesting chapters, which we are sure will be valuable to the readers. Chapters 1 to 6 deal with applications of mechatronics for the development of robotic systems. Medical and assistive technologies and human-machine interaction systems are the topic of chapters 7 to 13.Chapters 14 and 15 concern mechatronic systems for autonomous vehicles. Chapters 16-19 deal with mechatronics in manufacturing contexts. Chapter 20 concludes the book, describing a method for the installation of mechatronics education in schools

Design of Autonomous Cleaning Robot

Today, the research is concentrated on designing and developing robots to address the challenges of human life in their everyday activities. The cleaning robots are the class of service robots whose demands are increasing exponentially. Nevertheless, the application of cleaning robots is confined to smaller areas such as homes. Not much autonomous cleaning products are commercialized for big areas such as schools, hospitals, malls, etc. In this thesis, the proof of concept is designed for the autonomous floor-cleaning robot and autonomous board-cleaning robot for schools. A thorough background study is conducted on domestic service robots to understand the technologies involved in these robots. The components of the vacuum cleaner are assembled on a commercial robotic platform. The principles of vacuum cleaning technology and airflow equations are employed for the component selection of the vacuum cleaner. As the autonomous board-cleaning robot acts against gravity, a magnetic adhesion is used to adhere the robot to the classroom board. This system uses a belt drive mechanism to manoeurve. The use of belt drive increases the area of magnetic attraction while the robot is in motion. A semi-systematic approach using patterned path planning techniques for the complete coverage of the working environment is discussed in this thesis. The outcome of this thesis depicts a new and conceptual mechanical design of an autonomous floor-cleaning robot and an autonomous board-cleaning robot. This evidence creates a preliminary design for proof-of-concept for these robots. This proof of concept design is developed from the basic equations of vacuum cleaning technology, airflow and magnetic adhesion. A general overview is discussed for collaborating the two robots. This research provides an extensive initial step to illustrate the development of an autonomous cleaning robot and further validates with quantitative data discussed in the thesis