UC Berkeley Biomimetic Millisystems Lab (USA) SALTO / SALTO-1P (1)

UC Berkeley Biomimetic Millisystems Lab (USA) SALTO / SALTO-1P (2)

Not soldUniversity research robot. Funded by the US Army Research Laboratory and NSF.

Not for sale (research)Not programmableResearchGalago-inspiredWall jumps100 g

Not soldShipping: N/A. Not available. A university research platform.

Remote control: Not possible. A research prototype that is not distributed outside the lab.

Berkeley News (2016) ↗Salto-1P paper (IROS 2017) ↗

Overview

The robot that introduced 'vertical jumping agility' as a metric, modeled on the galago, which can chain jumps to 8.5 m in four seconds. Published in the first issue of Science Robotics (December 2016), SALTO scored 1.75 m/s, beating a bullfrog and reaching 78% of a galago, and could ricochet off a wall. The follow-on SALTO-1P (IROS 2017, 98 g) added aerodynamic thrusters and an inertial tail so it could hop continuously and steer in 3D, reaching a 1.25 m standing leap, and follow-up work (IROS 2018) studied the limits of precision jumping.

Specifications

Category	Jumpers & hoppers · Jumping & hopping robots
Released	2016
Availability	Not for sale (research)
Programmability	No programmability
Best for	Professionals & labs
Vision sensors	No vision sensors
Actuators	Unknown
Audio	No audio
Compute type	Arduino / ESP32 / microcontroller
Remote control	Not programmable
Size	26 cm tall fully extended, 100 g (original SALTO)
Locomotion	Single leg, a motor loads a latex series-elastic spring through a variable-mechanical-advantage eight-bar leg linkage ('power modulation'), SALTO-1P adds an inertial tail and two small propeller thrusters for aerial attitude control
Compute	ImageProc control board with a dsPIC33FJ128MC706A microcontroller and XBee radio (used on both SALTO and SALTO-1P)
Camera	None
Sensors	MPU-6000 6-axis IMU plus magnetic encoders on the leg linkage, leg motor and tail (SALTO-1P), external motion capture for position in most experiments
Runtime	Not published
Speed	Vertical jumping agility 1.75 m/s, single jumps to ~1.0 m, wall jump gains ~1.21 m
SDK	None public (lab code)