Flexible entrainment in a bio-inspired modular oscillator for modular robot locomotion

Abstract

The ability of a Central Pattern Generator to adapt its activity to the mechanical response of the robot is essential for robust autonomous locomotion in unknown environments. In previous works we have introduced a new oscillator model for locomotion in modular robots. In this paper, we study the ability of our oscillator model to entrain a servo. For a given configuration of the oscillator, we simulate different servos with different responsiveness, ranging from very slow to very fast servos. The result is that our oscillator adapts its frequency of oscillation to the responsiveness of the servo up to several orders of magnitude, without changing the parameters of the oscillator itself. © 2011 Springer-Verlag.