- Technology could one day be used to build interplanetary rovers
- The diameter of the wheels grows and shrinks automatically to enable the robot to either be strong or speedy
- They were joined by experts from Harvard to develop a robot using the technology, which can climb steps with ease
- Scientists were inspired to create the wheels by origami 'magic ball pattern'
Think of origami and you may imagine delicate paper cranes or fortune tellers.
But the art of folding paper to create 3D shapes has been used to make a flexible robot.
Roboticists have shown off two designs of origami-inspired wheel systems that allow a robot to shape-shift and climb a flight of steps using their intricate but strong wheels.
Researchers from Seoul National University, South Korea, have designed a robotic wheel based on the ‘magic ball pattern,’ which is a traditional technique used to create folded paper spheres.
The wheel can change its radius to create larger wheels to climb over things, and shrink back to a smaller size to squeeze under obstacles, IEEE Spectrum reported from its International Conference on Robotics and Automation.
The wheel's lead creator, Professor Kyu-Jin Cho explained that his design can shrink to have a radius of two inches (5.5cm), and expand to have a bigger footprint of four inches (12cm), using just one actuator per wheel.
There are also sensors placed on the outside of each wheel to detect changes in terrain.
Scientists at Harvard Microrobotics Lab teamed up with the group in Seoul to enable the origami wheels to expand and shrink automatically.