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Korea’s Institute for Machinery and Materials unveiled a pretty cool robotic wheelchair this week. By creating a compliant wheel that conforms to the terrain around it, these engineers have created an early version of a wheelchair that can climb stairs and traverse rocky terrain.
The wheel uses a “smart chain” structure, which means that a chain on the wheels attaches to spokes that change tension when confronted with changes in the terrain. The team says that this design was inspired by the surface tension properties of water droplets, which are rounded by gravity.
On today’s TechCrunch Minute, we’re looking at how these wheels work.
