Design and implementation of Omni-directional spherical modular snake robot (OSMOS)

Control, motion estimation, and planning of highly articulated snake robots have been challenging tasks for researchers. Even traversal on simple flat trajectory requires complex models of planar snake robot locomotion. This paper presents a novel design of an Omni-directional planar snake robot (OSMOS) consisting of mechanically and software linked spherical robot modules. This new design eliminates the problems of planar snake robots to handle versatile motions with complex gait analysis, by leveraging Omni-directional motion capabilities of spherical robots. This paper also presents the basic robot gaits which clearly demonstrate its design advantages such as fast turn speed and present simpler motion planning strategies. Experimental results that verify the effectiveness of this robot architecture and gaits that have been designed to traverse flat terrain are included.