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 Researchers on Thursday said they conducted experiments to learn
precisely how sidewinder rattlesnakes are able to climb sandy hills,
then applied the reptiles' repertoire to an existing snake robot so
it could do the same thing.
The study, published in the journal Science, is an example of how
scientists are applying knowledge of biology to improve technology.
Snake-like robots, rather than robots that move on wheels, offer
unique capabilities for such complicated tasks as search-and-rescue
operations in collapsed structures and inspecting nuclear power
plants, the researchers said.
"The snake robot can thread through tightly packed space to access
locations that people and conventional machinery cannot," said
robotics professor Howie Choset of the Robotics Institute at
Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh.
 Carnegie Mellon robotics researcher Hamid Marvi, who worked on the
study while at Georgia Tech, explained snakes' unique abilities.
"Snakes are the champion animal for moving on a wide range of
complex terrain," Marvi said. "They have different gaits and can
switch between them as needed. They have a special gait,
sidewinding, for successfully climbing on sandy hills."
The researchers observed the venomous sidewinder rattlesnake species
Crotalus cerastes, a denizen of the southwestern United States, as
it moved in a large enclosure at Zoo Atlanta filled with sand from
the Arizona desert.
The researchers raised the enclosure to create different angles in
the sand and used high-speed video cameras to better understand how
the rattlers were moving their bodies.
They found that the snakes improved their ability to climb sandy
slopes by increasing the amount of their body that makes contact
with the granular surface, using a unique wave motion.
The researchers applied their observations to a snake robot
developed at Carnegie Mellon. That "snakebot" had been able to use
one element of sidewinding motion to traverse level terrain but was
unable to climb sandy inclines that snakes easily handle.
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But once the snakebot was programmed with the wave motion employed
by rattlesnakes it succeeded in climbing sandy slopes.
"Now the robot can climb on inclinations of up to 20 degrees on
loose sand," Marvi said.
Before this study, the snake robot had trouble in climbing even
moderate sandy slopes of about 10 degrees, added Carnegie Mellon
Robotics Institute researcher Chaohui Gong.
"Our initial idea was to use the robot as a physical model to learn
what the snakes experienced," said Daniel Goldman, a professor at
Georgia Tech's School of Physics. "By studying the animal and the
physical model simultaneously, we learned important general
principles that allowed us to not only understand the animal, but
also to improve the robot."
The snakebot is made up of a series of 17 aluminum links with 16
joints, measuring about 37 inches (94 cm) long and 2 inches (5 cm)
in diameter. It contains a motor, electronics, computer and sensors.
(Reporting by Will Dunham; Editing by Leslie Adler)
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