The U.S. Army, in collaboration with the University of California, Berkeley, has developed a short, agile robot that could one day be used to aid in scouting and search and rescue operations.

The Salto robot stands less than a foot tall and, via radio control, uses a single leg to bounce in place, navigate obstacles and follow moving targets. Due to its small size, the U.S. Army believes that the Salto robot could navigate through rubble in search and rescue operations or military missions that require a tiny robot to squeeze into small areas.

"The physical environment the Army operates in is highly irregular, cluttered and constantly changing," said Dr. Samuel Stanton, program manager at Army Research Office, an element of U.S. Army Combat Capability Development Command's Army Research Laboratory. "The science underlying the advancements is critical for achieving the desired mobility, speed of action and situational awareness generation necessary for future Army operations."

In a disaster scenario, for example, Salto could find people trapped under rubble. These areas are typically too dangerous for human rescuers and Salto could be faster at locating trapped people. Salto's ability to jump high and quickly would also facilitate accessing places where humans would have trouble.

The robot’s leg is modeled after those of the galago, a tree-dwelling primate with tendons that store energy in a way that gives it the ability to string together multiple jumps in a matter of seconds.

Researchers equipped Salto with new technology that allows it to have a sense of itself and its own motion in order to make calculations about how high to jump to either avoid or traverse an obstacle.

The next steps are exploring the possibilities for hopping robots beyond their current capabilities through traditional wheeled and track locomotion, which are severely limited in 3D environments. Researchers will also explore how these robots can provide soldiers with unmanned systems that can be deployed in the field.