Platonic beasts: a new family of multilimbed robots

Describes class of spherically symmetric, high degree of freedom robots called "platonic beasts". A robot in this family is kinematically equivalent to a symmetric polyhedron, such as one of the platonic solids, with identical multi-purpose limbs attached to its vertices. The symmetry and regularity of the design have several advantages including robustness to toppling, novel gaits such as the rolling gait, and fault tolerance. The authors describe the design, simulation, and construction of a prototype platonic beast robot that the authors have built in their lab. The robot has four limbs, each with three degrees of freedom, and is controlled by a network of four embedded 32-bit microcontrollers. The authors also discuss the general features of these robots, including locomotion using the rolling gait and the implications of its novel features.<<ETX>>