Visitations – BioInMech Lab

IROS2022 Lab tour

hamamoto — Mon, 05 Dec 2022 04:42:45 +0000

After IROS2022, many researchers who participated in the conference came to visit our lab. We introduced various kinds of interesting robots and advanced research developed in our lab. The structures and control methods of robots were explained in detail and their movement was demonstrated.

Below are the questions from researchers who joined the lab tour and the answers from us.

Q1:（Quadruped Robot）How to know the robot is stable when the robot lifts one foot?

A1: The robot is stable when the vertical projection of the center of gravity (COG) remains inside the support polygon formed by the robot’s feet.

Q2:（Gripper）Where does the object “absorbed” by the robot go?

A2: It depends on the application scenarios. For example, the absorbed object will be placed on a conveyor belt in the object transportation scene.

Q3: (Crawler) How does the crawler climb stairs?

A3: It is realized by an underactuated mechanism. When the crawler encounters a step or an obstacle, the rotation movement of the track will be switched to another kind of movement like a lift arm.

Q4: Are all the robots shown in slides developed in this lab?

A4: Yes. More precisely speaking, the original version or idea was derived from Malab. For example, after graduating from Malab, Prof. Kakogawa developed many kinds of pipeline robots with high performance applied in different fields.

If you are interested, please check the Ritsumeikan University Robotics webpage for more details.

JIMA2016 @Tokyo

Kakogawa — Fri, 14 Oct 2016 13:58:28 +0000

We have participated in JIMA2016 Synthesis Inspection Equipment Exhibition held at Tokyo Big Sight for 3 days from Sep.28 to Sep.30, 2016. We exhibited and demonstrated a pipe inspection robot. The demonstration that the piping inspection robot vertically moves up and down was attracting people. http://www.jima-show.jp/english/index.html

By listening to the opinions of people working at the factory site, we were able get many opinions that we cannot hear simply by being in the laboratory.
Moreover, we were able to know problems such as durability of the robot. There are many people who want to use the robot immediately for inspection of infrastructure equipment and we feel that we have to tackle as soon as possible for practical application.

We don’t want our research to end in the laboratory. We would like to have many people see our research through exhibitions, etc. and conduct it that will be used somewhere in the future.

Workshop 2016@China

tian — Tue, 22 Mar 2016 16:15:21 +0000

“Workshop on Unmanned Technology for Inspection and Maintenance of Marine and Riverine Facilities” was held in China, 11th – 14th March, 2016.

Workshop in Tianjin University, Tianjin

Workshop in Tangshan

Workshop in Qingdao

JSSF2015 Science Zone

Kakogawa — Fri, 13 Nov 2015 15:56:25 +0000

Hello. This is Hisamune Matsumoto.(B4)
We went to “Japan Super Science Fair 2015(JSSF2015)」held at Ritsumeikan High School. We were in charge of the project called Science Zone 「Z-1　Snake-Like Robots」, high school students learned the movement principle of snake and practiced to move the snake type robot.

Ritsumeikan High School students and high school students who came from all over the world got a lecture in English about a snake movement principle.

After the lecture, they moved the robot for a competition.

And they also be able to move like this as they got used to it.

Personal comment “I want to be able to speak English“

Visit to Nankai University and Tianjin University

Kakogawa — Tue, 08 Apr 2014 08:58:46 +0000

Mr. Kakogawa and Mr. Matsuno visited to Nankai University and Tianjin University on March 17. We had a workshop in Tianjin University to exchange our research and introduce daily research life in Ma-lab.

Japan-China University Fair & Forum in China 2014

Kakogawa — Tue, 08 Apr 2014 08:51:51 +0000

Japan-China University Fair & Forum in China 2014 organized by JST (The Japan Science and Technology Agency) took place in Beijing (from March 15 to 19) and Shanghai (from March 21 to 24), China. Mr. Kakogawa (D2) and Mr. Matsuno (M2) took part in Beijing Fair & Forum.

Guests from Singapore

Kakogawa — Mon, 07 Apr 2014 01:49:30 +0000

As a part of JENESYS2.0 program Science and Technology (Robot Industry) 7th batch, 10 students from National University of Singapore and Nanyang Technological University visited the Department of Robotics and the Department of Human and Computer Intelligence at Ritsumeikan University, and they also visited our lab, on Thursday, March 13th.

Study tour to Kobelco Construction Machinery Co., Ltd.

Kakogawa — Thu, 26 Sep 2013 05:47:04 +0000

We conducted a study tour to Kobelco Construction Machinery Co., Ltd. Itsukaichi Factory, on Sep. 25.

Study tour to Kawasaki Heavy Industries, Ltd.

Kakogawa — Thu, 26 Sep 2013 04:35:55 +0000

On Sep. 17, six grad students in Ma-lab participated in the study tour to Kawasaki Heavy Industries, Ltd.

Science Demonstration Day

Kakogawa — Mon, 15 Jul 2013 07:18:34 +0000

July 13th, Science Demonstration Day was held at our campus. we had a visit from Ritsumeikan Moriyama high school.