These Block Bots From MIT Can Stack And Assemble Themselves Into Emergency Staircases

If you put these MIT M-Block robots next to the leaping humanoids of Boston Dynamics, they might not really be eye-catching. Putting aside their lack of limbs, the latest version of the blocks can do some impressive tricks including climbing, jumping, and assembling themselves into larger structures in Big Hero 6 style.

Undoubtedly, those skills could really be helpful given that they can assemble themselves and turn into an emergency staircase for the rescue of the survivors that are trapped inside a building. Or they can be deployed like real-life Minecraft blocks.

Inside each of the M-Block is a flywheel spinning at 20,000 rpm. Besides this flywheel, on each edge as well as face, there are permanent magnets. The combination allows them to use angular momentum to crawl, leap and spin, then attach themselves magnetically to other M-Blocks. Although the process seems to be simple, these robots can attach themselves to form structures and carry out tasks.

John Romanishin, the lead author, said that while the movement mechanisms of other robotic systems are much more complicated since they require many steps, their system is much more cost-effective and scalable. The unique thing about the M-Blocks is that they are robust, inexpensive and can be easily scaled to a million modules.

There are 24 different directions that the block can move in. Since they don’t have any protruding limbs, they won’t have any difficulty avoid collisions as well as clearing obstacles. The blocks communicate using barcodes which, compared to radio waves or infrared light, is more reliable, especially when there are a lot of blocks in the same spot.

To see whether the blocks, from a random structure, can form a straight line, the researchers did an experiment. In order to accomplish that, the blocks need to figure out their connection and in which directions should they move to form a line. The result is that about 90% of them could do so.

At the moment, only simple things such as form a light, follow arrows, follow lights can the 16 blocks do. What the researchers want to do next is to increase the number of blocks with improved capabilities to form more complex structures. We have seen that in movies before, but the researchers believe that instead of terminating lives, the M-Blocks will be extremely helpful in saving lives.