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Principle Investigator
Principle Investigator
Kathryn Daltorio
Kathryn Daltorio
Kathryn Daltorio’s robotics research is inspired by animal behaviors that exceed current robot capabilities. She has studied the locomotion of earthworms, decision-making in cockroaches, and climbing in geckos and insects. Her robots won autonomous lawn mowing competitions, were the first to climb vertically with gecko-inspired adhesives on simple feet, and provided platforms for testing hypotheses about animal locomotion and neurobiologically-inspired control. She and her students build a range of robotic prototypes that use fabrics, mechanical linkages, adhesives, servomotors and shape-memory alloy actuators, various sensors and cameras, soft and hard polymers, and modular 3D printed parts to explore new designs and control strategies. These provide test-beds for scalable neurobiologically-inspired control networks, abstract mathematical modeling and optimization, and other software tools. Her current goals are to:
make robots even more capable of traversing through and working in diverse, unknown environments and
to better understand animals as model smart physical systems.
Postdoctoral Scholars
Postdoctoral Scholars
Austin S. Mills
Dissertation: Mechanically Compliant Worm-Like Robotics: Exploiting Polymer Properties for Design, Simulation, and Fabrication
Jianfeng Zhou
Research in Human-Robot Interaction with Hexapod Robot, Mecatronics, Force Sensing, Haptic Feedback, and Teleoperation
Ph.D. Students
Ph.D. Students
Isira Vithanage
Research in the Development of a Pneumatically Driven Worm Robot
Ryan Walker Brown
Research in Simulation of Granular Media and Hexapod Robots
Joshua Towns
Research in Improving End Effectors and Walking Speed for the Munitions Response Crab Robot
Jiyuan Jiang
Research in the mechanical design, fabrication, sensor integration, and automation for CrabLine robots
Mingyu Pan
Research in Visualizing the Underwater Localization of Mr.Crab
Maxwell Rollins
Research in odometry and simulation of crab-like robot walking
M.S. Students
M.S. Students
Benjamin Poulin
Research in realtime image dehazing in high turbidity water
Victor DiTommaso
Light Weight Crab Robot Legs
Sophia Bricker
MR.Crab 2
Undergraduate Students
Undergraduate Students
Simon Fox
Research Assistant
Drill Head Team
Alessandra Galvan Flores
Technology to Market Strategist
Thomas Moonan
Research Assistant
Drill Head Team
Jonathan Tseng
Research Assistant
Staff Members
Staff Members
Stephen Howe
Operations Manager
Ph.D. Alumni
Ph.D. Alumni
Shane Riddle
2026
Research in Soft Robot Modeling and Bio-inspired Neural Control Networks
John Grezmak
2025
Dissertation: Sensing for enhanced perception and autonomy for crab-inspired robotics in surf zones
Yifeng Gong
2024
Dissertation: Legged Robot Retrieval with the Whole Body To Grasp a Heavy Object
Natasha Rouse
2024
Dissertation: Networks of Saddles to Visualize, Learn, Adjust and Create Branches in Robot State Trajectories
Yang Chen
2022
Dissertation:Common challenges and solutions for arthropod and robot walking motions
Yifan Wang
2022
Dissertation: Preparing worm-like robots for unknown environments: Perception and Path Planning
Nicole Graf
2022
Dissertation: Development of Crab-like Robots for Amphibious Behaviors in Surf-zones
Akhil Kandhari
2020
Dissertation: Control and Analysis of Soft Body Locomotion on a Robotic Platform
M.S. Alumni
M.S. Alumni
Jordan Gray
2026
The Development of a Periphyton Sampler and its Integration with Crab-Inspired Robots
Huy Pham
2026
Polysectoid a hyperredundant soft-bodied robot for modeling the role of parapodia in undulation and peristalsis
Conner Riley
2026
Modeling Strain Dynamics in Haltere Variations in Flapping Flies: Computational Modeling on Mechanosensation
Olivia Gatchall
2025
Peristaltic underground robot power line extraordinaire (PUR-PLE): Earthworm inspired compliant robot with integrated fabric skin.
William Jun-Roberson
2025
Utilizing Hall Effect Sensors in the end effectors to improve submersible hexapod traversal and climbing gait
MacKenzie Crowe
2024
Benthic Scanning Improvements in Crab Robots
Daniel Cui
2024
Design and Manufacturing of a Locust Inspired Jumping Robot
Ethan Wood
2024
Embedding Textiles into 3D Printed Robot Feet to Control Ground Penetration
Zachary Silberstein
2023
Control Trajectories for Improved Efficiency and speed of a crab-like robot.
Kevin Salipante
2023
Rigidity Measurement Robotic System for Parkinson's Disease: Design, Construction, and Validation Tools
Nathan Labrie
2023
6 DOF Klann-based Walker for the Acquisition of UXO in an aquatic environment
Emma Ries
2022
Crab-like dactyl testing in two beach sands and play sand
Mingyi Wang
2021
Position Tracking of a Worm-like Robot Using Distributed Sensors
Chunchu Zhu
2021
A Comparison of Measurement Techniques for Lake Waves
Zehao Liu
2021
Obstacle Avoidance Path Planning for Worm-like Robot
Xiaoyue Xu
2020
Design of a compliant robotic leg using Klann mechanism
Prathamesh Pandit
2019
Path Planning for Worm-like Locomotion
Weijia Ye
2018
Improved Control and Reduced Motion Slip for Worm Robot Turning
Yifan Huang
2018
A Mathematical Model to Study Mesh-Based Worm Robots
Collaborators
Collaborators
Guillaume A Sartoretti
National University of Singapore
Kelly Dorgan
University of Texas at Austin
William Stewart
Stony Brook University
Paolo Celli
Stony Brook University
Glenna Clifton
University of Portland
Dustin Tyler
Case Western Reserve University
Michael Fu
Case Western Reserve University
Zonghe Chua
Case Western Reserve University
Ali Khosravi
Auburn University
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