Organised chaos gets robots going

In humans and animals, periodically recurring movements like walking or breathing are controlled by small neural circuits called 'central pattern generators' (CPG). Scientists have been using this principle in the development of walking machines. To date, typically one separate CPG was needed for every gait. The robot receives information about its environment via several sensors - about whether there is an obstacle in front of it or whether it climbs a slope. Based on this information, it selects the CPG controlling the gait that is appropriate for the respective situation...

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