Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in

Distributed reconfiguration of metamorphic robot chains

  • Published:
Distributed Computing Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract.

The problem we address is the distributed reconfiguration of a planar metamorphic robotic system composed of any number of hexagonal modules. After presenting a framework for classifying motion planning algorithms for metamorphic robotic systems, we describe distributed algorithms for reconfiguring a straight chain of hexagonal modules to any intersecting straight chain configuration. We prove our algorithms are correct, and show that they are either optimal or asymptotically optimal in the number of moves and asymptotically optimal in the time required for parallel reconfiguration.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Log in via an institution

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Institutional subscriptions

Similar content being viewed by others

References

  1. Bojinov H, Casal A, Hoag T: Emergent structures in modular self-reconfigurable robots. In: Proc. of IEEE Intl. Conf. on Robotics and Automation, vol. 2, pp 1734-1741 (2000)

  2. Bojinov H, Casal A, Hoag T: Multiagent control of self-reconfigurable robots. In: Proc. of Fourth Intl. Conf. on Multiagent Systems, pp 143-150 (2000)

  3. Butler Z, Byrnes S, Rus D: Distributed motion planning for modular robots with unit-compressible modules. In: Proc. of IEEE Intl. Conf. on Intelligent Robots and Systems, pp 790-796 (2001)

  4. Casal A, Yim M: Self-reconfiguration planning for a class of modular robots. In: Proc. of SPIE Symposium on Intelligent Systems and Advanced Manufacturing, vol. 3839, pp 246-256 (1999)

  5. Castano A, Shen W-M, Will P: CONRO: Towards miniature self-sufficient metamorphic robots. Autonomous Robots Journal 8: 309-324 (2000)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  6. Chiang C-J, Chirikjian G: Similarity metrics with applications to modular robot motion planning. Autonomous Robots Journal, special issue on self-reconfiguring robots, 10(1): 91-106 (2001)

    Google Scholar 

  7. Chirikjian G: Kinematics of a metamorphic robotic system. In: Proc. of IEEE Intl. Conf. on Robotics and Automation, pp 449-455 (1994)

  8. Chirikjian G, Pamecha, A: Bounds for self-reconfiguration of metamorphic robots. Proc. IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation, pp 1452-1457 (1996)

  9. Chirikjian G: Metamorphic hyper-redundant manipulators. In: Proc. of Intl. Conf. on Advanced Mechatronics, pp 467-472 (1993)

  10. Chirikjian G, Pamecha A, Ebert-Uphoff I: Evaluating efficiency of self-reconfiguration in a class of modular robots. Journal of Robotic Systems 13(5): 317-338 (1996)

    Article  MATH  Google Scholar 

  11. Dumitrescu A, Suzuki I, Yamashita M: High speed formations of reconfigurable modular robotic systems. Proc. IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation, pp 123-128 (2002)

  12. Fukuda T, Buss M, Hosokai H, Kawauchi Y: Cell structured robotic system CEBOT (control, planning and communication methods). Intelligent Autonomous Systems 2: 661-671 (1989)

    Google Scholar 

  13. Hamlin GJ, Sanderson AC: Tetrobot: A modular approach to reconfigurable parallel robotics. Kluwer Academic Publishers, Newton, MA (1997)

  14. Hosokawa K, Tsujimori T, Fujii T, Kaetsu H, Asama H, Kuroda Y, Endo I: Self-organizing collective robots with morphogenesis in a vertical plane. In: IEEE Intl. Conf. on Robotics and Automation, pp 2858-2863 (1998)

  15. Kotay K, Rus D: Scalable parallel algorithm for configuration planning for self-reconfigurable robots. In: Proc. of the Conf. on Sensor Fusion and Decentralized Control in Robotic Systems III, (SPIE RB06) (2000)

  16. Lee WH, Sanderson AC: Dynamic analysis and distributed control of the tetrobot modular reconfigurable robot system. Autonomous Robots Journal, special issue on self-reconfiguring robots 10(1): 67-82 (2001)

  17. Murata S, Kurokawa H, Kokaji S: Self-assembling machine. In: Proc. of IEEE Intl. Conf. on Robotics and Automation, pp 441-448 (1994)

  18. Murata S, Kurokawa H, Tomita K, Kokaji S: Self-assembling method for mechanical structure. In: Artif. Life Robotics 1: 111-115 (1997)

    Google Scholar 

  19. Murata S, Kurokawa H, Yoshida E, Tomita K, Kokaji S: A 3-D self-reconfigurable structure. In: Proc. of IEEE Intl. Conf. on Robotics and Automation, pp 432-439 (1998)

  20. Murata S, Yoshida E, Kamimura A, Kurokawa H, Tomita K, Kokaji S: M-TRAN: Self-reconfigurable modular robotic system. IEEE/ASME Trans. on Mechatronics 7(4): 431-441 (2002)

    Google Scholar 

  21. Nguyen A, Guibas LJ, Yim M: Controlled module density helps reconfiguration planning. New Directions in Algorithmic and Computational Robotics. A.K. Peters, pp 23-36 (2001)

  22. Nilsson M: Free climbing snake robot. IEEE Control Systems, pp 21-26 (1998)

  23. Pamecha A, Chirikjian G: A useful metric for modular robot motion planning. In: Proc. of IEEE Intl. Conf. on Robotics and Automation, pp 442-447 (1996)

  24. Pamecha A, Ebert-Uphoff I, Chirikjian G: Useful metrics for modular robot motion planning. IEEE Trans. on Robotics and Automation 13(4): 531-545 (1997)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  25. Pamecha A, Chiang C-J, Stein D, Chirikjian G: Design and implementation of metamorphic robots. In: Proc. of ASME Design Engineering Technical Conf. and Computers in Engineering Conf. (1996)

  26. Prevas K, Unsal C, Efe M, Khosla P: A hierarchical motion planning strategy for a uniform self-reconfigurable module robotic system. In: Proc. of IEEE Intl. Conf. on Robotics and Automation, pp 787-792 (2002)

  27. Rus D, Vona M: Physical implementation of the crystalline robot. In: Proc. of IEEE Intl. Conf. on Robotics and Automation, pp 1726-1733 (2000)

  28. Rus D, Vona M: Crystalline robots: Self-reconfiguration with compressible unit modules. Autonomous Robots Journal, special issue on self-reconfigurable robots 10(1): 107-124 (2001)

    Google Scholar 

  29. Salemi B, Shen W-M, Will P: Hormone-controlled metamorphic robots. In: Proc. of IEEE Intl. Conf. on Robotics and Automation, pp 4194-4199 (2001)

  30. Suh J, Homans S, Yim M: Telecubes: Mechanical design of a module for self-reconfigurable robotics. In: Proc. of the IEEE Intl. Conf. on Robotics and Automation, pp 4095-4101 (2002)

  31. Tomita K, Murata S, Kurokawa H, Toshida E, Kokaji S: Self-assembly and self-repair method for a distributed mechanical system. IEEE Trans. on Robotics and Automation 15(6): 1035-1045 (1999)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  32. Unsal C, Kiliccote H, Khosla P: A modular self-reconfigurable bipartite robotic system: implementation and motion planning. Auton. Robot. 10: 23-40 (2001)

    Google Scholar 

  33. Vassilvitskii S, Yim M, Suh J: A complete, local and parallel reconfiguration algorithm for cube style modular robots. In: Proc. of the IEEE Intl. Conf. on Robotics and Automation, pp 117-122 (2002)

  34. Walter J, Tsai B, Amato N: Choosing good paths for fast distributed reconfiguration of hexagonal metamorphic robots. In: Proc. of the IEEE Intl. Conf. on Robotics and Automation, pp 102-109 (2002)

  35. Walter J, Welch J, Amato N: Concurrent metamorphosis of hexagonal robot chains into simple connected configurations. IEEE Trans. on Robotics and Automation (2002,) to appear

  36. Walter J, Welch J, Amato N: Distributed reconfiguration of hexagonal metamorphic robots in two dimensions. In: Sensor Fusion and Decentralized Control in Robotic Systems III, Gerard T. McKee and Paul S. Schenker, eds., Proceedings of SPIE, 4196: 441-453 (2000)

  37. Yim M: A reconfigurable modular robot with many modes of locomotion. In: Proc. of Intl. Conf. on Advanced Mechatronics, pp 283-288 (1993)

  38. Yim M, Duff D, Roufas K: Polybot: a modular reconfigurable robot. In: Proc. of the IEEE Intl. Conf. on Robotics and Automation, pp 514-520 (2000)

  39. Yim M, Lamping J, Mao E, Chase JG: Rhombic dodecahedron shape for self-assembling robots. SPL TechReport P9710777, Xerox PARC (1997)

  40. Yoshida E, Murata S, Tomita K, Kurokawa H, Kokaji S: Distributed formation control of a modular mechanical system. In: Proc. of the Intl. Conf. on Intelligent Robots and Systems, pp 1090-1097 (1997)

  41. Yoshida E, Murata S, Kurokawa H, Tomita K, Kokaji S: A distributed reconfiguration method for 3-D homogeneous structure. In: Proc. of the Intl. Conf. on Intelligent Robots and Systems, pp 852-859 (1998)

  42. Zhang Y, Yim M, Lamping J, Mao E: Distributed control for 3D shape metamorphosis. Autonomous Robots Journal, Special Issue on Self-Reconfigurable Robots (2000)

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Computer Science, Vassar College, NY 12604-0351, Poughkeepsie, USA

    Jennifer E. Walter

  2. Department of Computer Science, Texas A&M University, TX 77843-3112, College Station, USA

    Jennifer L. Welch & Nancy M. Amato

Authors
  1. Jennifer E. Walter
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Jennifer L. Welch
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  3. Nancy M. Amato
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Jennifer E. Walter.

Additional information

Received: 28 October 2002, Accepted: 31 October 2003, Published online: 1 March 2004

Corresdpondence to: Jennifer E. Walter

Nancy M. Amato: amato]@cs.tamu.edu

A preliminary version of this paper appeared in the Proc. of the 19th ACM Symposium on Principles of Distributed Computing, July 2000, pages 171-180. The work of N. Amato and J. Walter was supported in part by NSF CAREER Award CCR-9624315, NSF Grants IIS-9619850, ACI-9872126, EIA-9975018, EIA-0103742, EIA-9805823, ACR-0081510, ACR-0113971, CCR-0113974, EIA-9810937, EIA-0079874, by the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board grant ARP-036327-017, and by the DOE ASCI ASAP program grant B347886. The work of J. Walter was supported in part by Department of Education GAANN and GE Faculty of the Future fellowships.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Cite this article

Walter, J.E., Welch, J.L. & Amato, N.M. Distributed reconfiguration of metamorphic robot chains. Distrib. Comput. 17, 171–189 (2004). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00446-003-0103-y

Download citation

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00446-003-0103-y

Keywords:

Search

Navigation