Abstract
We investigate how a physically inert vehicle, which we call a “boat,” can locomote through a smart fluid by communicating with the particles of a smart fluid, and thereby inducing the fluid to exert forces and moments on the boat. Our smart fluid is composed of a swarm of Kilobot robots that move on a flat surface. The boat communicates with the fluid particles through wireless messages sent from its bow and stern. By sending different pairs of messages from its bow and stern the boat directs the subsets of the smart fluid in different locations to move in different ways. This enables the boat to maneuver forward, turn left, and turn right. In experiments on a physical testbed, we evaluate how the presence and size of the boat’s rudder affects motion efficacy. We find that using a small rudder provides better overall motion than using no rudder or using a large rudder.
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Acknowledgements
We would like to thank Nicholas Casertano for helping with the Kilobot code, Abigail Motter for assisting with the testing process, Brian Motter for the use of his billiards table, Christoph Neisess for printing the rudders, and Aaron Becker for his conversations with Michael Otte in which he helped develop the concept for this paper.
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Motter, P., Hoover, Z., Otte, M. (2021). Sailing a Boat Through a Macroscopic Smart-Fluid Composed of a Robot Swarm. In: Siciliano, B., Laschi, C., Khatib, O. (eds) Experimental Robotics. ISER 2020. Springer Proceedings in Advanced Robotics, vol 19. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-71151-1_38
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-71151-1_38
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