Jonathan Salton, Stephen Buerger, Lisa Marron, John Feddema, Gary Fischer, Charles Little, Barry Spletzer, Patrick Xavier, Alfred Rizzi, Michael Murphy, John Giarratana, Matthew Malchano, Christian Weagle
Hopping robots provide the possibility of breaking the link between the size of a ground vehicle and the largest obstacle that it can overcome. For more than a decade, DARPA and Sandia National Laboratories have been developing small-scale hopping robot technology, first as part of purely hopping platforms and, more recently, as part of platforms that are capable of both
wheeled and hopping locomotion. In this paper we introduce the Urban Hopper robot and summarize its capabilities. The advantages of hopping for overcoming certain obstacles are discussed. Several configurations of the Urban Hopper are described, as are intelligent
capabilities of the system. Key challenges are discussed.
Sandia National Laboratories has developed a mesoscale hopping mobility platform (Hopper) to overcome the longstanding problems of mobility and power in small scale unmanned vehicles. The system provides mobility in situations such as negotiating tall obstacles and rough terrain that are prohibitive for other small ground base vehicles. The Defense Advanced Research Projects Administration (DARPA) provided the funding for the Hopper project.
In this paper, we quantify how communication increases the effective range of detection of unattended ground sensors. Statistical analysis is used to evaluate the probability of detection for multiple sensors using one, two, and infinite levels of cooperation. Levels of cooperation are defined as the levels of communication between sensors. One level of cooperation means that one sensor passes its state information to several other sensors within a limited communication range, but this information is not passed beyond this range. Two levels of cooperation means that the state information received by this first set of sensors is relayed to another set of sensors within their communication range. Infinite levels of cooperation means that the state information is further percolated out to all sensors within a communicating group. With large numbers of sensors, every sensor will have state information about every other sensor regardless of communication range. With smaller numbers of sensors, isolated groups may form, thus lowering the probability of information transfer.
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