Neural Preprocessing and Control of Reactive Walking Machines

Book excerpt: This book presents biologically inspired walking machines interacting with their physical environment, and shows how the morphology and behavior control of machines can benefit from biological studies. The purpose is to develop a modular structure of neural control generating reactive behaviors of the physical walking machines, to analyze the neural mechanisms underlying them, and to demonstrate the sensor fusion technique leading to smooth switching between appropriate behaviors, like obstacle avoidance and sound tropism.