2017/11/17 by Francesco Corucci, Corucci, Francesco, Nick Cheney +7 · 1 citation
Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology · Computer Science · Physics and Astronomy · #Artificial Intelligence (cs.AI) #Cellular Mechanics and Interactions #FOS: Computer and information sciences #Micro and Nano Robotics #Neural and Evolutionary Computing (cs.NE) #Reinforcement Learning in Robotics #Robotics (cs.RO)
paper · pdf · doi:10.48550/arxiv.1711.06605
openalex publication_date 2017/11/17 · openalex created_date 2022/10/03 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/28
Designing soft robots poses considerable challenges: automated design\napproaches may be particularly appealing in this field, as they promise to\noptimize complex multi-material machines with very little or no human\nintervention. Evolutionary soft robotics is concerned with the application of\noptimization algorithms inspired by natural evolution in order to let soft\nrobots (both morphologies and controllers) spontaneously evolve within\nphysically-realistic simulated environments, figuring out how to satisfy a set\nof objectives defined by human designers. In this paper a powerful evolutionary\nsystem is put in place in order to perform a broad investigation on the\nfree-form evolution of walking and swimming soft robots in different\nenvironments. Three sets of experiments are reported, tackling different\naspects of the evolution of soft locomotion. The first two sets explore the\neffects of different material properties on the evolution of terrestrial and\naquatic soft locomotion: particularly, we show how different materials lead to\nthe evolution of different morphologies, behaviors, and energy-performance\ntradeoffs. It is found that within our simplified physics world stiffer robots\nevolve more sophisticated and effective gaits and morphologies on land, while\nsofter ones tend to perform better in water. The third set of experiments\nstarts investigating the effect and potential benefits of major environmental\ntransitions (land - water) during evolution. Results provide interesting\nmorphological exaptation phenomena, and point out a potential asymmetry between\nland-water and water-land transitions: while the first type of transition\nappears to be detrimental, the second one seems to have some beneficial\neffects.\n