Truly autonomous robots: hardware design for an energy trophallactic robot

摘要

This article describes the mechanical and electrical design of a mobile robot called the CISSbot. CISSbot is abbreviated from our center's name in Danish: Center for Indlejrede Software Systemer. The robots are designed toward truly autonomous robots in large populations through energy trophallaxes. Unlike present mobile robots, the CISSbots are energetically autonomous robots because they are not able not only to autonomously refuel by picking up batteries at a charging station, but also to share energy by exchanging batteries with other robots. The CISSbots basically consist of their own processing power, sensors, and actuators. However, to achieve the capability of battery exchange, the CISSbots need a special design of battery exchange mechanism. In this paper, we present the realization of the design in both the mechanics and the electronics of the CISSbot. Details of the battery exchange technique and power management are clarified. Finally, the article gives an outline of our future work on the CISSbots.