Caterpillar treads can skid or sink in certain types of snow and ice (Image: Rich LaSalle/Getty)
IT IS often said there’s no point reinventing the wheel, but when it comes to getting rescue robots into and out of avalanches, that may be just what is needed. So say researchers in Japan who have developed an adjustable wheel that can adapt to different kinds of snow conditions.
Robots are increasingly used to locate survivors of disasters such as earthquakes, who can be trapped in places too risky for human rescuers. “But few are applicable to rescue in snow,” says Taro Iwamoto…
