Format

On Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday morning there will be three short one-and-a-half hour tutorials. The format of these tutorials will be hands-on and highly interactive. Each tutorial will start with a short introduction, followed by practical exercises. The aim of the tutorials is to introduce the main topic of the day, related to dynamic walking, and to provide all participants with a basic understanding of the concepts and principles related to the field. In this way, every participant will be able to follow along with the talks and discussions of the day, even when they have a different background. For each tutorial, all participants will sign up as either ‘expert’ or ‘student’, based on their background and expertise. Small groups will be formed and experts will help the students with exercises and questions, so that students can learn from the experts, and experts can learn from explaining their knowledge to others, and from the new points of view raised by the students. Please note that the tutorials serve as a 'social engineering' tool as well, to encourage interaction amongst all participants. New employers or employees may be found...

Tutorial 1: Limit cycle analysis

Tuesday 9:50 – 11:30
The first tutorial will address how to build a simple dynamic walking model using computer simulations. Topics we will work on include: how to derive equations of motion, how to solve these EOMs forward in time using ODE solvers, how to find a limit cycle, and how to test the stability of this limit cycle.
Prerequisites: laptop computer with Matlab

Tutorial 2: Human Gait Analysis

Wednesday 9:40 - 11:30
The second tutorial will address the analysis of ‘real’ human gait. A full example data set will be available , including video with projected ground reaction force vector, kinematic and kinetic data, and electromyography (EMG) of muscle activation patterns. Free software will be distributed that allows analyzing these data with a user friendly interface. Matlab data and software will be available as well. Questions to discuss in (or after) this tutorial may include: how do we manage to do such a simple thing as walking? Where do we generate and lose energy? How ‘passive dynamic’ is our walking pattern? What can we learn about human walking from passive dynamic walkers, and what can we learn from human walking to optimize our dynamic walkers?

Tutorial 3: Build your own Passive Dynamic Walker!

Thursday 10:20-11:50
In this tutorial participants will be challenged to follow up on Tad McGeer, and build their own simple 2D passive dynamic ramp-walking prototype! Material and tools will be available, but the creative ideas should come from participants. Use the simulation of the first tutorial and test ideas from the second tutorial, while building the simplest walking robot possible!

Winning team