A Basis for Self-Repair Robots Using Self-Reconfiguring Crystal Modules.pdf

A Basis for Self-Repair Robots Using Self-Reconfiguring Crystal Modules Robert Fitch Daniela Rus Marsette Vona Dept. of Computer Science Dept. of Computer Science A.I. Lab Dartmouth, USA Dartmouth, USA MIT, USA Abstract. Self-repair robots are modular robots that have the ca- pability of detecting and recovering from failures. Typically, such robots are unit-modular and carry a number of redundant modules on their bodies. Self-repair consists of detecting the failure of a module, ejecting the bad module and replacing it with one of the extra modules. In this paper we show how self-repair can be accomplished by self-reconfiguring Crystalline robots. We describe the Crystalline robots, which consist of modules that can aggregate together to form distributed robot sys- tems and are actuated by expanding and contracting each unit. This actuation mechanism permits automated shape metamorphosis. We also describe an algorithm that uses this actuation mechanism for self-repair. 1 Introduction Self-reconfiguring robots have the ability to adapt to the operating environment and the required functionality by changing shape. They consist of a set of identical robotic modules that can autonomously and dynamically change their aggregate geometric structure to suit different locomotion, manipulation, and sensing tasks. A primary design goal for a self-reconfiguring robot is to allow the robot to assume any geometric shape, as opposed to other types of shape-changing robots, which may only take one of a small number of shapes. Self-reconfiguring robots typically consist of multiple modules, which confers the robot system redundancy. This built-in redundancy leads to interesting fault-tolerance and self-repair properties. If an arbitrary part of a fixed-architecture robot fails, the robot cannot usually perform self-repair; a human or a different robot must perform the task. Intuitively, a self-repair system must have at least two qualities: the ability to self- modify, and the avai