Remember the Cheetah robot that we did talk about a couple of years ago, trumpeting the fact that at one point during testing, this particular robot managed to be faster than Usain Bolt at his best? You might be interested to hear that researchers over at the Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology’s (KAIST) MSC Lab have managed to come up with a sprinting robot that will be different from Boston Dynamics’ Cheetah, modeling it after the extinct velociraptor instead.
Yes sir, a robot that is modeled after a dinosaur that became famous in the Jurassic Park movies, now how about that for irony? It does not require four legs, just two would make the Raptor fast enough to clock up a whopping 46kph (28.5mph) on a treadmill, which makes it faster than Usain Bolt, and edging precariously close to the Cheetah that managed to hit 47kph (29.3mph) in September a couple of years ago. Considering how the Raptor is lightweight as well as minimal in size instead of being bulky and solid, it is definitely a development in the right direction.
Ditching solid feet in favor of a couple of flexible carbon-fibre prosthetic blades on lightweight legs that feature just one motor each, this “tendon” enables the legs to reclaim some of the energy that they expend, helping it run faster than Usain Bolt in the process.
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