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A major aim of mobile robotics is to provide machines with greater autonomy allowing them to move about in and manipulate their environment independently of human intervention. In the living world, in the course of evolution several insect species have developed efficient and robust navigational abilities. This has motivated roboticists to look for biological navigation mechanisms that can be implemented in an autonomous mobile robot. This spatial ability is particularly astonishing in social insects (ants, bees, wasps), so-called central place foragers, which use different sets of navigational strategies to return to their home after each foraging excursion despite rather simple neurosensory equipment.Our project, conducted in close collaboration between researchers working in the field of informatics/robotics and ethology, was first to develop locomotion algorithms directly inferred from the spatial behaviour of two ant species (Cataglyphis cursor and Gigantiops destructor) studied both in the field (semi-desert and tropical terrains) and in visually controlled laboratory conditions.The algorithms were then succesfully implemented in a biomimetic robot prototype moving from place to place on the basis of the ants’ navigational strategies. Extension of this preliminary work to mass-produced robot models requires more logistical and financial investments. |
