[HN Gopher] Bird-inspired drone uses legs to walk and jump into ...
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Bird-inspired drone uses legs to walk and jump into the air
Author : bookofjoe
Score : 180 points
Date : 2025-01-07 00:31 UTC (3 days ago)
(HTM) web link (spectrum.ieee.org)
(TXT) w3m dump (spectrum.ieee.org)
| litenboll wrote:
| First thought when reading the title was that it will look very
| fragile and clumsy when walking (even real birds do) and that was
| confirmed by the first video. What's the purpose of actually
| mimicing bird legs and feet? Why not use something more simple
| like wheels on a board that has a spring for example? I expected
| the article to justify why, but to me it seems like the big thing
| was the jumping itself, which does not require complex bird
| anatomy necessarily. There's probably a good reason that I
| missed, but this feels like a too direct translation of the bird
| feature, unless the purpose is specifically to make it look and
| move like a real bird.
| pixxel wrote:
| Spy drones than mimic birds.
| 9dev wrote:
| It's going to get interesting when the conspiracy theory
| becomes reality. Imagine the future historians browsing the
| Reddit archives going like, "they knew!!"
| Super_Jambo wrote:
| More likely that sensible mainstream journalists will laugh
| at people under Govt surveillance because they sound like
| the reddit conspiracy nuts from their youth...
| oefrha wrote:
| What conspiracy? CIA had spy pigeons among other animals
| half a century ago, which is public info by now.[1]
|
| They are very proud of it too.
|
| > While many of the animal programs studied by CIA were
| never deployed operationally--or failed for a variety of
| technical, logistical, or behavioral reasons--collectively
| they demonstrate the incredible innovation and creative
| thinking that has come to characterize everything that our
| Directorate of Science and Technology does.
|
| [1] https://www.cia.gov/stories/story/natural-spies-
| animals-in-e...
| 0xEF wrote:
| Every good conspiracy theory starts with a truth, I
| guess.
|
| I had no idea about the CIA thing. I just always assumed
| the "birds aren't real" meme to be a way of showing how
| ridiculous the police state is going to become in the
| next decade or so as surveillance gets more and more
| weaponized against the people it was supposed to protect.
| butlike wrote:
| I always took "birds aren't real" to be an absurdist take
| on paranoia
| JKCalhoun wrote:
| Like the Chinese one?
|
| https://interestingengineering.com/military/chinese-
| special-...
| mapt wrote:
| Military contractors have been producing teaser videos on
| the subject for maybe fifteen years now.
| gattr wrote:
| Makes you wonder what will come first:
|
| - energy-efficient, long-lasting, mechanically optimized
| robotic "birds"
|
| - good-enough understanding of the avian brain connectome &
| operation, such that all you need is a bunch of fine wires
| stuck in it, and a small CPU sending commands (local and
| remote operation, etc.)
| Cthulhu_ wrote:
| https://www.reddit.com/r/BirdsArentReal/
| veunes wrote:
| It's like the ultimate bio-inspired stealth tech.
| scripturial wrote:
| Avoiding cheap surveillance technologies seems like a big deal.
| Although I assume once the government works out what you can do
| with it, it'll become illegal pretty quickly. I assume this
| research will attract DOD grant funding pretty quickly.
| Students have to eat somehow.
| ivell wrote:
| Wheels need a reasonably flat surface to be efficient. Walking
| is more efficient than flying for short distances..
| numba888 wrote:
| > reasonably flat
|
| comparing to wheel size. one can use bigger light wheels.
| that would make landing on short runways possible. besides,
| wheeling is much easier than walking. two wheels balancing
| and rolling around is not a problem today. but.. without legs
| it's just an common airplane, nothing to talk about. the best
| of both? put small motorized wheels instead of flat platforms
| for feet.
| bookofjoe wrote:
| 2 more things that can break/go wrong/stop working
| resulting in mission failure.
| numba888 wrote:
| 1 working wheel is enough for balancing. they can be as
| simple as just a motor in rubber. it's more likely tail
| or wing will fail than both motors
|
| BTW, here is how it works from Boston Dynamics, it can
| jump:
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LHJKGgwpWY8
| lynguist wrote:
| > the big thing was the jumping itself, which does not require
| complex bird anatomy necessarily
|
| No, this is exactly the opposite. The jumping requires exactly
| this specific anatomy for so many reasons. It stores energy in
| the joints, it has a specific balance, the jumping works at
| multiple angles, etc, etc. You can't do better than that for
| this specific purpose.
| veunes wrote:
| Maybe there's a niche application we're not considering where
| bird-like movement is crucial?
| DoingIsLearning wrote:
| Worth pointing out that EPFL's PR release includes a picture of
| Won Dong Shin (the PhD that actually built it) as opposed to a
| picture of the lab's director as it sometimes happens in
| academia.
| accurrent wrote:
| THIS. Ive found good advisors push there students forward,
| mediocre ones tend to push themselves. Academic robotics is
| plagued with profs who do "everything".
| chinathrow wrote:
| The article contains an image of him.
| DoingIsLearning wrote:
| I am assuming IEEE is not travelling the world doing
| investigative journalism, they will have used whatever media
| was provided by the university.
| bobim wrote:
| Yes because otherwise they would have fact checked that
| there's no lake Geneva.
| uhoh-itsmaciek wrote:
| Lake Geneva is the English name commonly used to refer to
| Lac Leman. I suspect you know that, but I don't follow
| why you object to that name.
| bobim wrote:
| Interesting, that's the equivalent of me unilaterally
| calling New York "Nouvelle Amsterdam" then. But it was
| simply to tickle Geneva's people.
| krisoft wrote:
| > that's the equivalent of me unilaterally calling New
| York "Nouvelle Amsterdam" then
|
| This is very common. The name used by the locals is
| called endonym and the one used by foreigners is the
| exonym.
|
| For example Zhonghua is the endonym vs China the exonym.
| Or Magyarorszag vs Hungary. Or Deutschland vs Germany. Or
| so I not just list English exonyms Lake Balaton vs
| Plattensee.
| guerrilla wrote:
| Alright, we're getting there. Still feels like there's a very
| long way to go.
| cies wrote:
| If your drone can land on a high spot and save energy by not
| flying, while using energy to use camera and radio
| communications, that would be really nice!
|
| Also: the noise a drone makes, gives away it's presence.
| rob74 wrote:
| Bonus points for being able to perch on a thin branch, wire
| etc.
| bookofjoe wrote:
| https://www.silentflyer.tech/
| rauljara wrote:
| Would love to see a pterosaur / bat version of this drone. Birds
| use one set of muscles to jump in the air and another to flap
| their wings, limiting how big they can get. That's because, if
| you make your wing muscles bigger, then you need bigger leg
| muscles to support them, then you need bigger wing muscles to
| support your legs, etc. pterosaurs and bats have tiny little legs
| and use their "arm" (wing) muscles to do the initial jump into
| the air. It's just one set of muscles that are used for both
| functions, which is why pterosaurs were able to get so big. It
| does beg the question, tho, why we haven't seen any truly giant
| bats.
|
| This pbs aeons video has a great explanation:
| https://youtu.be/scAp-fncp64?si=hjeWKGBI7riyjE1M
| type0 wrote:
| > It does beg the question, tho, why we haven't seen any truly
| giant bats.
|
| They're mammals, birds have different respiratory system
|
| "Flow-Through Ventilation
|
| Unlike mammals, birds breathe through continuous one-
| directional flow of air through the respiratory system. We take
| air in and breathe it out, sort of like the tide moves in and
| out of a bay. As a result, our breathing system is said to be
| tidal. Avians have a non-tidal respiratory system, with air
| flowing more like a running stream."
|
| https://birdfact.com/anatomy-and-physiology/respiratory-syst...
| keyle wrote:
| Nature optimizes. The bigger you get, the more you need to
| eat. The harder it gets to fly. Fruit bats eat fruits.
|
| Look at the food source and you'll understand the evolution.
| vanderZwan wrote:
| > _Fruit bats eat fruits._
|
| The most caloric dense source of nutrition available in
| nature? I don't see why that is a limitation to body size
| for a flying animal - quite the opposite!
| TeMPOraL wrote:
| Plants aren't particularly calorie-dense. Meat, on the
| other hand...
| the__alchemist wrote:
| Look at great apes. Large land mammals in general. (Apes
| came to mind specifically because they usually eat fruit)
| vanderZwan wrote:
| Are you aware you switched "fruit" for "plant" there?
| Jerrrry wrote:
| Fruits want to be eaten, Veggies don't.
| mdarens wrote:
| this is almost in "not even wrong" territory, but for the
| fact that autotrophs are definitionally the entry point
| for abiotic energy into edible calories for animals, and
| the observation that the largest terrestrial megafauna
| are herbivorous.
|
| bamboo is not calorie dense to humans, because we've lost
| the ability to digest most of it, but pecans are
| absolutely more calorie dense than even fatty beef.
|
| all else being equal, an ideal carbohydrate source is
| more calorically dense than an equivalent ideal lean
| protein source due to the balance in the thermic effect
| of food between the two. most mammals outside the
| obligate carnivores are really well optimized for getting
| calories from plants-- this is why we have amylase in our
| saliva.
| fsckboy wrote:
| fruit bats are the biggest bats
|
| not GP but I think that was the point.
|
| also, volume grows as the cube of linear dimensions which
| also puts an upper limit on size, as wing surface area
| only grows as the square (not sure what/how lift grows
| relative to)
| vanderZwan wrote:
| That's why mammals can't breathe at high altitudes that birds
| can, but I'm not sure if that affects the body plan much in
| terms of size. The largest birds are smaller than the largest
| mammals on land or at sea. Then again, lower oxygen levels
| compared to the past seems to be a limitation for insect
| sizes too (who have an even less efficient respiratory
| system).
|
| I also don't think it's the warmbloodedness. There are giant
| mammals in general after all.
|
| Perhaps it is because bats form large, dense colonies? There
| is only so many resources available in any given ecological
| niche, so then for any species that fills a niche one would
| expect those resources to be divided either among many small
| individuals or a few large ones. Bat evolution chose the "big
| colony" route, which I assume favors smaller individuals.
| aziaziazi wrote:
| > The largest birds are smaller than the largest mammals on
| land or at sea
|
| With all my respect to you theory I think comparing size of
| animals should not ignore the medium they moved in: water,
| land or air. Weight is (loosely but still) related to size.
| It's probably not a coincidence the largest mammals lives
| on water where they need less energy to supper their
| weight, and it's not a coincidents the largest mammals on
| earth are way bigger that bats.
|
| The biggest bats are ~1.7m which is not so far from biggest
| albatros (3.7m).
|
| Also consider the biggest bird (Ostriches) can't fly. Now
| I'm trying to picture a swimming gigantic bird.
| totallykvothe wrote:
| An Emperor Penguin?
| aziaziazi wrote:
| Right! To complete the unusual list : flying fish and...
| Amphibious fish! Wikipedia says there's 11 of them. Ok
| stop procrastinating now.
| vanderZwan wrote:
| Well, fair. But birds are warmblooded too so that doesn't
| change much there, and on top of that the difference in
| requiring bigger _lungs_ for the same amount of oxygen
| extraction would exactly add much weight per volume, so
| to speak
| vanderZwan wrote:
| Robots and living animals have different limitations and
| constraints though: compared to separate legs and wings for
| animals, using one motor with some kind of gearbox to switch
| output from wings/propellers to legs might have a lower added
| cost in terms of weight . The legs can stay very skinny. The
| limitation would be how bulky such a gearbox would be, and how
| much extra kinetic energy loss it would introduce. At the same
| time creating functioning wings that can also work as legs
| sounds like it might be a huge challenge in robotics (unless
| there's a way to massively simplify it).
|
| Definitely an interesting idea that should be investigated
| though! :)
|
| (Also, I've seen so many "AI learns to walk" videos that I'm
| wondering if it could be used to find a design that would work
| for this task)
| bArray wrote:
| I think I might be building one of these... This is insanely
| cool.
| Modified3019 wrote:
| The initial GIF is a bit lackluster, as it looks like it's just
| walking around dragging a tail. The full video posted later in
| the article is _much_ more impressive.
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-8DJ1a3sLIc
|
| The article itself is worth a read too imo, I found the bits
| about toes for easier balance and jumping to takeoff energy
| efficiency interesting.
| ge96 wrote:
| It's still cute walking around like robots with character
| astrobe_ wrote:
| Naval versions of fighters can use "jump strut" [1]. For instance
| the Rafale M [2] [3]. I dislike weapons, but those planes are
| amazing.
|
| [1]
| https://www.researchgate.net/publication/257410805_Effect_Of...
|
| [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dassault_Rafale#Overview
|
| [3] https://www.alachassebordel.com/post/20-secrets-about-
| naval-...
| mhb wrote:
| > I dislike weapons
|
| A throwaway comment, but huh?
| major505 wrote:
| You talk like we already don't know that birds are now real, and
| are actualy goverment drones.
| veunes wrote:
| I love bio-inspired robotics. It'll be interesting to see how
| these evolve. And the drone itself (for me do not know why) looks
| really cute.
| rob74 wrote:
| > _Despite its name, RAVEN is approximately the size of a crow_
|
| This phrase first puzzled me, but after some googling I found out
| that in English "raven" is generally used for bigger crows. Until
| now I had thought that raven was just a more elegant-sounding
| synonym for crow. TIL...
|
| EDIT: to my surprise, it's the same in my native German: the
| bigger ones are called "Raben", the smaller ones "Krahen".
| TIL2...
| pajko wrote:
| Could this be viable on Mars? Having legs might support a bigger
| range of terrains than wheels while the flying mode requiring
| more resources might be used sparingly to overcome bigger
| elevation changes or to cover a higher distance quicker.
|
| Tough adding legs instead if wheels might introduce balancng
| issues, the drone could be lowered further to ground level for
| the time of harsh weather conditions to increase the traction.
| kidel001 wrote:
| Ah yes, the bird-inspired ... nose propeller.
| adolph wrote:
| See also this week's IEEE Robot Friday for another uav with bird-
| inspired legs:
|
| _We've seen hybrid quadrotor bipeds before, but this one, which
| is imitating the hopping behavior of Jacana birds, is pretty
| cute. . . .What's a Jacana bird, you ask? It's these things,
| which surely must have the most extreme foot to body ratio of any
| bird_
|
| https://spectrum.ieee.org/video-friday-arms-on-vacuums
| Nezghul wrote:
| Future warfare would be really fun. You would have to eliminate
| every single animal you find because it could be drone.
| popcalc wrote:
| Yes, we must shoot down the flying bears.
| Mistletoe wrote:
| Is there info on how efficient this is compared to a regular
| drone? I suspect the boring regular drone with four propellers on
| each corner destroys this.
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