Self-Reconfiguring Boats
Modular robotic boats which can assembly into marine structures.
Self-reconfiguring boats offer promise for a wide range of marine applications, including building temporary infrastructure, remote maintenance, search-and-rescue operations, environmental monitoring, and on-demand transportation. However, achieving autonomous self-reconfiguration on the water surface, even in two dimensions, remains challenging. Complex nonlinear hydrodynamics, disturbances from self-motion and neighboring robots, and environmental factors impose obstacles for successful autonomous behaviors. This project works on a group of miniature modular robotic boats, capable of self-assembling into physically connected structures, self-reconfiguring, and collectively traveling as larger assemblies via a hybrid coordination framework.
