Takram designed this robotic insect to mimic the motion of a live insect instead of it's shape. It's hard to tell from the video, however the website mentions that it follows a tripodal gait, meaning that at any time, it has three legs on the ground, two on one side and one on the other. To move forward, the other three legs are rotated forward and then lowered, causing the original three legs to lift off of the ground. This enables the robot to move about quickly while remaining stable, because it always has at least three points touching the ground. Their project was inspired by Stanford's SPRAWL robots.
[via Pink Tentacle]
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