Biomimetic Robotics Lab, MIT
MIT Mechanical Engineering lab led by Prof. Sangbae Kim that created the Cheetah 3 and backflipping Mini Cheetah quadrupeds and the MIT Humanoid.
The Biomimetic Robotics Laboratory is a research group in the Department of Mechanical Engineering at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, located in Room 3-137 on MIT's Cambridge campus. Led by Professor Sangbae Kim, the lab designs and controls robots 'using insights taken from the natural world', with a focus on dynamic legged locomotion, proprioceptive actuation and manipulation. Its current team lists one postdoctoral associate, Ph.D., S.M. and M.Eng. students, and a visiting Ph.D. student, and it also runs undergraduate (UROP) research projects.
Robots. The MIT Mini Cheetah, unveiled in March 2019 and presented at ICRA 2019, is a roughly 20-pound quadruped and a smaller version of the lab's larger Cheetah 3. It uses 12 compact motors (three per leg) built from commercially available drone and RC-aircraft motors, each with a 6:1 gearbox, giving a lightweight, high-torque, low-inertia design with modular, easily swapped actuators. It runs at about 5 mph, trots over uneven terrain, walks upside down, rights itself after a fall, and was described by MIT as the first four-legged robot to perform a backflip from a standing position. The team built around ten Mini Cheetahs to loan to other research labs, and the platform has since been used by other groups, including UC Berkeley's Hybrid Robotics lab. The MIT Humanoid is the lab's dynamic, acrobatic humanoid research platform, and the lab also shows a teleoperated proprioceptive manipulation arm.
Research topics. Recent published research areas include combining model-based control with reinforcement learning, reflexive control for manipulation, sensor design for manipulation, fast whole-body model predictive control for legged robots, multi-axis large-force sensor arrays for human and robotic applications, and optimal actuator design.
Primary type & automation activities this supplier delivers:
MIT Mini Cheetah
- Model: Mini Cheetah
- Launch Year: 2019
20-lb research quadruped with 12 modular low-inertia motors; first four-legged robot to backflip.
MIT Humanoid
Dynamic, acrobatic humanoid research platform from the Biomimetic Robotics Lab.
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