Molecule
Simulation
Simulation is an important part of our Molecule research. It is
difficult and time consuming to build hundreds of Molecule robots, however using
simulation we can learn about systems with many more robots than we could build
by hand. Our early simulations were simple systems of two or four units
that demonstrated basic motion properties:
Our later simulations involved more Molecule modules. In
these simulations we investigated walking, tower building, and stair climbing.
This movie shows 20 Molecule modules climbing stairs:
Our newest simulations use over 150 Molecules to show our
scaffold-based planning method in action. Scaffold-based planning used
tiles of Molecules (groups of 54 Molecules arranged in a specific shape) to
create structures with tunnels in the interior. These tunnels can be used
to increase the amount of parallel movement during a reconfiguration. The
following movie shows a tile reconfiguration in which the tile on the lower
right moves through the two center tiles to a position on the upper left:
