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Toward adaptive underwater locomotion, this paper presents the experimental results of fish-like swimming robots that we have newly developed. By using motor control with only one degree of freedom, these robots exhibit surprisingly rich behavioural diversity in three dimensional underwater environment. This paper focuses on some of the behavior variations, i.e. forward, turning, and vertical movement, which are required for the underwater three dimensional navigation. The visual behavior analysis shows that, even though there is only one motor, these behavior are possible because these robots exploit the unique interaction with the environment derived from the morphological properties. For better understanding how the material influences the swimming behaviour, a second robot with bending sensors implemented in its tail-fin measures the deflexion during swimming. Moreover, some of the behaviors demonstrated by these robots have a considerable similarity to those of biological systems, which would also contribute to understand the adaptive behavior of animals. Based on the experimental results, we speculate further issue on ``cheap" underwater locomotion.

"Cheap" Underwater Locomotion: Roles of Morphological Prope...

"Cheap" Underwater Locomotion: Roles of Morphological Properties and Behavioural Diversity

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