Cassie, The Ostrich Bipedal Robot That Can Walk 5K

Cassie's ostrich-inspired robot. (youtube screenshot)

JAKARTA - You might recognize Cassie as the base of Agility Robotics' delivery bot, Digit. However, if you've kept up with technology at all, you'll know that it started life as the ostrich-inspired Cassie. The robot is just in the form of all legs and not much else.

In addition to driving Agility's commercial ambitions, the robot has proven a solid platform for exploring bipedal locations. Announced by Oregon State University professor Jonathan Hunt in 2017, Cassie was created with a $1 million grant from the DoD (US Department of Defense), which has been quite familiar in the world of robotics development.

Now, the team from the Dynamics Robotics Laboratory at OSU's College of Engineering are highlighting how they continue to push Cassie to the limits of her bipedal ability. The team says the robot is capable of running 5K (kilometers) wirelessly, on a single charge. Cassie isn't going to beat the human world record anytime soon, but the 53-minute and three-second run, is still an impressive showcase for the technology.

The robot's run time included about 6.5 minutes in troubleshooting, when the team tackled a computer that overheated and when it failed to turn and had time to drop it.

"Cassie is a very efficient robot by design and build, and we were really able to push the limits of hardware and show what it can do," said OSU student Jeremy Dao in a statement.

According to the team, Cassie basically taught herself to run using a deep reinforcement learning algorithm. This allows the system to know how to stay upright by shifting its balance while running.

“Deep reinforcement learning is a powerful method in AI that unlocks skills like running, jumping up and down and walking up and down stairs,” added another student, Yesh Godse.

In May this year, the OSU team also demonstrated how Cassie can walk up and down stairs without the aid of a lidar or on-board camera.