The cheetah from MIT learned to move from trot to gallop on the run and became the second in the world in speed walking robot

The robot cheetah, created in the laboratory of bionics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, set a new personal speed record - 22 kilometers per hour. Although it is about half the maximum speed of the Boston Dynamics cheetah , for other important indicators the MIT cheetah is far superior to its faster countryman. First, he is able to go from trot to gallop on the run. Secondly, in terms of energy efficiency, it is far superior to the other four-legged robots, closely approaching a live cheetah. Thirdly, thanks to this efficiency, it is one step ahead of the Boston Dynamics cheetah in terms of autonomy: although an external power source was still used on the test bench, a 3 kg ballast was installed on the robot, simulating a battery with which the robot can travel about 10 km at a speed of 8.3 kilometers per hour.



The MIT cheetah design is fundamentally different from the Boston Dynamics cheetah. At the forefront of its creators put energy efficiency. Instead of hydraulics, specially developed electric drives with low revs but high torque are used. They serve not only as engines, but also as very perfect shock absorbers capable of changing the degree of their elasticity in a wide range, while the energy of hitting the foot on the ground is not dissipated as heat, but returns to the battery. Power consumption at the maximum running speed was about one kilowatt.

According to the project manager, Professor Kim Sang Be, the next version of the cheetah, with improved electric motors, will be one and a half times more efficient, approaching the performance of the best natural runners and even flying animals, and its speed will exceed 50 kilometers per hour.
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Previously, the second place in run speed was occupied by the development of another robotic laboratory MIT - Leg Laboratory, whose robot Planar Biped accelerated to 21 kilometers per hour.