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There is a growing number of research groups actively involved in modular robotics research. To date, about 30 systems have been designed and constructed, some of which are shown below.
[[Image:g3dock.jpg|200px|right|PolyBot G3]]
'''PolyBot G3 (2002)'''
A chain self-reconfiguration system. Each module is about 50mm on a side, and has 1 rotational DOF. It is part of the PolyBot modular robot family that has demonstrated many modes of locomotion including walking: biped, 14 legged, slinky-like, snake-like: concertina in a gopher hole, inchworm gaits, rectilinear undulation and sidewinding gaits, rolling like a tread at up to 1.4m/s, riding a tricycle, climbing: stairs, poles pipes, ramps etc. More information can be found at the [http://www.parc.com/modrobots/ polybot webpage at PARC].
[[Image:Klavins-programmable-parts.jpg|200px|right|Self Organizing Programmable Parts]]
'''The Programmable Parts (2005)'''
[[Image:Klavins-programmable-parts.jpg|200px|right|Self Organizing Programmable Parts]] The programmable parts are stirred randomly on an air-hockyhockey table by randomly actuated air jets. When they collide and stick, they can communicate and decide whether to stay stuck, or if and when to detach. Local interaction rules can be devised and optimized to guide the robots to make any desired global shape. More information can be found at the [http://sveiks.ee.washington.edu/video/ programmable parts web page].
[[Image:SuperBotStand.png|200px|right|The SuperBot modules]]
'''[http://www.isi.edu/robots/superbot SuperBot] (2006)'''
[[Image:SuperBotStand.png|200px|right|The SuperBot modules]] The SuperBot modules fall into the chain/tree architecture. The modules have three degrees of freedom each. The design is based on two previous systems: [http://www.isi.edu/robots/conro Conro] (by the same research group) and [http://unit.aist.go.jp/is/dsysd/mtran3 MTRAN] (by Murata et al.). Each module can connect to another module through one of its six dock connectors. They can communicate and share power through their dock connectors. Several locomotion gaits have been developed for different arrangements of modules. For high-level communication the modules use hormone-based control, a distributed, scalable protocol that does not require the modules to have unique ID's.
[[Image:DogPict.jpg|200px|right|Self-Assembly by Dissasembly]]
'''Miche (2006)'''
[[Image:DogPict.jpg|200px|right|Self-Assembly by Dissasembly]] The Miche system is a modular lattice system capable of arbitrary shape formation. Each module is an autonomous robot module capable of connecting to and communicating with its immediate neighbors. When assembled into a structure, the modules form a system that can be virtually sculpted using a computer interface and a distributed process. The group of modules collectively decide who is on the final shape and who is not using algorithms that minimize the information transmission and storage. Finally, the modules not in the structure let go and fall off under the control of an external force, in this case gravity.
More details at [http://groups.csail.mit.edu/drl Miche] (Rus et al).
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