Quadrupedal Gait Generation Based on Human Feeling for Robot Assisted Therapy

In the field of pet robots and robot assisted therapy (RAT), animal motion is important for robots resembling various animals. This paper presents a method for the generation of animal gait in quadrupedal robots. In this study, we employ AIBO as an experimental quadrupedal robot and generate the AIBO´s gait on the basis of an animal´s gait. First, we optimize the orbit of mono-leg, which can efficiently output a propulsive force, by imitating a dog´s gait and using a genetic algorithm. Moreover, we generate the quadrupedal gait of AIBO using both the optimum orbit of the mono-leg and an animal´s gait, which is classified the gait of walking dog based on the zoology. Furthermore, we have performed questionnaires to include the human feeling, and choose the best gait for AIBO from among the various abovementioned gaits.