Aracna: An Open Source 3D Printed Walking Robot

We will demonstrate Aracna, a new open source, 3D printed quadruped robot platform developed at the Cornell Creative Machines Lab. The demo will feature the robot performing several gaits and a discussion of how and why the robot was designed. We’ll also tell people how easy it is to 3D print and assemble their own Aracna using the open-source CAD files and drivers we provide.
aracna_black_2_rs

 

About the authors

Jason Yosinski is a PhD student at the Cornell Creative Machines Lab, where he investigates Artificial Intelligence and builds robots. At Cornell he helped create the first robotic guest to be interviewed on NPR, and his work in AI has been featured in New Scientist, Slashdot, RT, and the BBC.

Sara Lohmann is a recent graduate of Cornell University with a BS in Mechanical Engineering ’11 and MEng in Systems Engineering ’12. In addition to designing the hardware for Aracna, Sara enjoyed other creative design projects during her time at Cornell, including Cornell Cup USA, Consumer Product Design Sponsored by Hasbro, and an automatic bartender named Francois BarBot. She is currently working for the Department of the Navy.

Eric Gold is a junior computer science major. In addition to his work with robotics in the Cornell Creative Machines Lab, he spends his time running, biking, and playing the violin.

Jeff Clune is a Postdoctoral Fellow in Hod Lipson’s lab at Cornell University, funded by a Postdoctoral Research Fellowship from the US National Science Foundation, and will soon be an assistant professor in the Computer Science Department at the University of Wyoming. He studies the evolution of artificially intelligent robots using generative encodings, which enhance evolutionary algorithms by augmenting them with concepts from developmental biology.

Jeremy Blum is a grad student at Cornell University pursuing a masters in Electrical and Computer Engineering.  His research focuses on robotic systems and sustainable energy systems.  He is also an Electrical Engineer at MakerBot Industries and he teaches engineering via his popular youtube videos.

Hod Lipson is a professor of Mechanical & Aerospace Engineering and Computing & Information Science at Cornell University. His work focuses on two “grand challenges” of engineering: can we design machines that can design other machines, and can we make machines that can make other machines.