2011 IEEE International Conference on Control System, Computing and Engineering

Development of a Modular General Purpose

Controller Board for Biologically
Inspired Robot
M. Amudha
Cosmopoint, Level 16-2, Wisma
Sachdev, Jln Raja Laut, 50350
Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
Corresponding author:
amudha.khan@gmail.com

M. K. A. Ahamed Khan,
Universiti Industri Selangor
Kampus Bestari Jaya,
Jln T. Tambahan
45600 Berjuntai Bestari
Malaysia

AbstractThis paper describes the development of a

modular general purpose controller board for
biologically inspired robot. The circuits are designed
using Protel, an electronic design software that bring
together the traditionally separate disciplines of board
design, programmable hardware design and software
development. The general purpose controller board
which currently has five categories; power,
communication, microcontroller, inputs, and outputs, is
divided into five different modular boards. The design,
development and evaluation of the general purpose
controller board is found to be able to meet the
requirements of biologically inspired robots.

In this paper, we report the development of a

controller board which has been divided into five
modular boards based on the categories; power,
communication, microcontroller, inputs, and outputs.
Each circuit board is in small size as the robot itself
will be in a small size. This design assists in
allocating each circuit board near the mechanism
itself and helps the user to do the troubleshooting
without disturbing other parts of the controller board.
This design can also be used as an educational kit for
the undergraduate students in developing a controller
board.

Keywords: Controller board, biologically inspired robot,

modular

II. REQUIREMENTS OF BIOLOGICALLY

INSPIRED ROBOT

I. INTRODUCTION

An in-depth design requirement for biologically

inspired robots is given in [13, 14]. Generally, the
design of biologically inspired robot relies on the
innovative combination of standard mechanical and
electrical components of smaller size. For example,
the researchers in [15] have developed biologically
inspired robot of a German Shepherd dog where the
skeleton consists of a few passive joints in which
each provides rotational degree of freedom (DOF) as
shown in Figure 1.

The idea of building machines that emulate

features of animals has proliferated in the last two
decades [1]. The use of artificial intelligence,
effective artificial muscles and other technologies has
contributed to the possibility of making realistically
looking and behaving robots [2, 3].
Several researchers have stated that any attempt to
implement in hardware and software specific features
of a real animal can improve our understanding of
those features; however, to build a realistic robot is
still a challenge. In this regard, currently, the
dimension of controller board has its limitation on the
biologically inspired robot that has evolved to be
smaller and smaller [4-7].
For robotics industry, any microcontroller-based
controller is an integral part of mobile robot which
provides the intelligence to the robot [8]. Several
boards [9-12] that have been developed do no meet
the requirements of biologically inspired robot. The
goal of this research is to develop a modular general
purpose PIC-based controller board for biologically
inspired robot.

978-1-4577-1642-3/11/$26.00 2011 IEEE

I. Elamvazuthi, Aliah Abd Jamil,

P. Vasant and T. Ganesan
Universiti Teknologi
PETRONAS
Bandar Seri Iskandar, 31750
Tronoh, Malaysia

Figure :1 Biologically-Inspired Skeleton of a Shepherd and the

Pantograph Mechanism [15]

526

2011 IEEE International Conference on Control System, Computing and Engineering

In this design, all motors are controlled through a

communication interface with a general purpose
micro-controller board. In another example, the
researchers in [16] have designed a biologicallyinspired legged locomotion ant-autonomous which
moves using onboard simple micro-controller. The
robot is shown in Figure 2.

Figure 3: Modular Board Configurations

The microcontroller uses the master-slave concept

to increase the inputs and outputs as shown in Figure
4.
Figure 2: Biologically-Inspired Legged Locomotion AntAutonomous [16]

This research has shown that biologically-based

intra- and inter- leg coordination can be implemented
with the developed microcontroller board, lowcomputation-capable microcontrollers such that small
legged robots can have a high level of mobile
autonomy, while still possessing the dynamic walking
ability necessary to move toward goals while
navigating uneven terrain.
Insects are frequently used as the inspiration for
biologically inspired robot designs because of their
ability to easily navigate difficult and uneven terrain.
However, giving robots the ability to sense and react
to their terrain can require large amounts of
computation ability. Large robots have enough size to
carry computers with them, but for small, biologically
inspired robots require a modular microcontroller
board.

Figure 4: Master/Slave Configurations

IV. DESCRIPTION OF HARDWARE STRUCTURE

The schematic diagram of the microcontroller
which uses the master-slave concept is shown in
Figure 5. The micro-controller is a functional
computer system-on-a-chip. The pin configuration of
the PIC 16F877A microcontroller is given in Table 1.
TABLE I: PIN CONFIGURATION OF PIC16F877A
MICROCONTROLLER

III. HARDWARE STRUCTURE

The development of a PIC-based controller board
is the general purpose platform with adequate I/Os for
the functioning of biologically inspired robot. The
controller board includes the microcontroller itself,
along with its essential components. The design
concept for the controller board for biologically
inspired robot was broken into five main categories.
The five major categories are power, communication,
microcontroller, inputs, and outputs as shown in
Figure 3.

Figure 6 shows the overall controller board and

Figure 7 shows the modular boards.

527

2011 IEEE International Conference on Control System, Computing and Engineering

Figure 5: Schematic Diagram of the Microcontroller Board

Figure 6: Overall Controller Board

Master/Slave
Microcontroller
Communication

Inputs

Power Supply

Outputs

Figure 7: Modular Boards

528

2011 IEEE International Conference on Control System, Computing and Engineering

V. PROGRAMMING

A. Power
This circuit board provides power supply to the
main board. A voltage regulator was incorporated to
automatically maintain a constant voltage level. The
over-current and reverse-polarity power protection is
achieved by using a PPTC fuse coupled with a
1N4007 diode. A PPTC fuse greatly increases in
resistance when the fuse current rating is exceeded.
This resistance increases to the point that the fuse
effectively becomes an open connection. For the
reverse current protection, a 1N4007 diode is
connected in a crow-bar configuration. When the
power is connected with reverse polarity, the 1N4007
diode conducts, and the current causes the fuse to trip.

The ICSP (In Circuit Serial Programming) and

LVP (Low Voltage Programming) capabilities were
used to program the microcontroller board. ICSP
programming is performed using two pins, clock and
data, while a high voltage (12V) is present on the
Vpp/MCLR pin. Low voltage programming dispenses
with the high voltage, but reserves exclusive use of an
I/O pin and can therefore be disabled to recover the
pin for other uses (once disabled it can only be reenabled using high voltage programming). The
advantages of a boot loader over ICSP is the far
superior programming speeds, immediate program
execution following programming, and the ability to
both debug and program using the same cable. The
two microcontrollers were linked using a master /
slave programming concept. Example programs are
shown in Figure 8 and 9 respectively.

B. Microcontroller
A microcontroller is a functional computer
system-on-a-chip. It contains a processor core,
memory, and programmable input/output peripherals.
Two PIC16F877A microcontrollers were used as the
master slave configuration to increase the inputs and
outputs.

//MASTER program
#include <16F877A.h>//
#fuses
NOWDT,NOPROTECT,XT,NOLVP,PUT
#use delay(clock=4000000)
float val=0;
int8 data=0;
setup_spi( SPI_MASTER | SPI_H_TO_L | SPI_XMIT_L_TO_H |
SPI_CLK_DIV_16 );
while(1)
{
spi_write(data);
printf("\n\rdata = %u dataf = %f",data,val);
}
}

C. Inputs
A controller board has various types of inputs such
as sensors, switches, and analog-to-digital converter.
The programmer can choose to use either sensors,
switches, or analog-to-digital converter based on the
required application. The sensor which is used to
sense data from the robot is able to receive analog
signal and convert it to digital. Switches are used to
control motors and LEDs.

Figure 8: Master Program

D. Outputs
The output of controller board consists of the DC
motor and brushless motor. For these motors, motor
driver is needed to control the speed and rotation of
the motor. It is usually an external circuit which
attached to controller board. For the DC motor
outputs, H-bridge chips are used. These chips are
commonly used to control motors in small robots. In
one chip, it provides two DC motor H-bridges. Each
H-bridge allows bi-directional control of a DC motor.

//SLAVE program
#include <16F877A.h>//
#fuses NOWDT,NOPROTECT,XT,NOLVP,PUT
#use delay(clock=4000000)
#use rs232(baud=9600,xmit=PIN_C6,rcv=PIN_C7)
int8 data=0;
void main()
{
setup_spi(SPI_SLAVE|SPI_H_TO_L|SPI_SS_DISABLED);
output_high(PIN_C4);
output_high (PIN_C5);
while(1)
{
if(SPI_DATA_IS_IN())
{
data = spi_read();
output_b(data):
output_toggle(PIN_D4);
printf("\n\r data = %u",data);
}

E. Communication
The
communication
board
provides
communication between PIC and the programmer. It
consists of USB port to load a program and a switch
for reset. An USB port type B which has a square
shape was used in this board. Type B plugs deliver
power and therefore, analogous to a power socket. An
USB was instead of RS232 to reduce space on the
circuit board.

}
}
Figure 9: Slave Program

529

2011 IEEE International Conference on Control System, Computing and Engineering

The coding shows how the master transmit the

data by using the function spi_write and the slave
microcontroller read the data by using the function
spi_read. Both coding is important for SPI
configuration to run. By having these coding, the
Master will be able to transmit and slave will be able
to receive.

biologically inspired robot which would be very

useful.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
The authors would like to thank their respective
universities for their support.

VI. PERFORMANCE TESTING

REFERENCES

The performance testing of the boards was carried

out in two stages. In the first stage, a multi-meter was
used to test the pins of the boards after the program
was loaded into PIC16F877A through the
communication circuit. This is shown in Figure 10.

[1]

[2]

[3]
[4]
[5]
[6]
[7]

Figure 10: Manual Performance Testing

[8]

In the second stage, the program was run

automatically and functions of the board were
determined. Figure 11 shows that the microcontroller
and outputs circuits functioned well as both of the
LEDs were switched on during the testing.

[9]
[10]
[11]
[12]
[13]

[14]
Figure 11: Performance Testing

Overall, the developed board was tested and it

found to be working well in interlinking all the boards.

[15]

VII. CONCLUSION
Technologies that allow developing biologically
inspired system are increasingly emerging. As we are
inspired by biology to make more intelligent robot to
improve our lives, we will increasingly be faced with
challenges to such implementations. This paper
focused on the development of a controller board for

[16]

530

S. Klug, T. Lens, O. von Stryk, B. Mohl, and A. Karguth,

Biologically inspired robot manipulator for new
applications in automation engineering, in Proceedings of
Robotik 2008, ser. VDI-Berichte, no. 2012. VDI
Wissensforum GmbH, June 2008.
Ayers, J. & Witting, J., Biomimetic approaches to the control
of underwater walking machines, Philosophical Transactions
of the Royal Society A-Mathematical Physical and
Engineering Sciences, 2007.
Webb, B., Validating Biorobotic Models, Journal of Neural
Engineering, 2006.
Fred Delcomyn, Biologically Inspired Robots, University of
Illinois, U.S.A, 2007.
John Lim, Chris McCarthy, David Shaw, Luke Cole, Nick
Barnes, Insect Inspired Robot, Australian National
University, 2006.
Karl Williams, Build Your Own Reptilian Robot, McGraw
Hill, 2003.
Jizhong Xiao, Ali Saddgh, Matthew Elliott, Angel Calle,
Avinash Persad, Ho Ming Chiu, Design of Mobile Robot
with Wall Climbing Capability, Proceedings of the 2005
IEEE/Asme, International Conference on Advance
Intelligent Mechatronics, Monttrey, California, USA, 24-28
July, 2005.
John Lim, Chris McCarthy, David Shaw, Luke Cole, Nick
Barnes, Insect Inspired Robots, Department of Information
Engineering, RSISE, Australian National University, 2007.
Cytron AR40B Autonomous Robot Control Board
Instruction Manual, November 2007.
K.T. Kornegay, R.W. Brodsen, A Test Controller Board for
TSS, Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer
Sciences, University of California, Berkeley, 1991.
Daniel Esperante, Achim Vollhardt, Design and
Development of the Control Board for the LHcb Silicon
Tracker, 2007.
Pavel Monat, Dan Werthimer, The Design of GALFA
Quadrature Down converter Controller Board, SETI
Program, Space Sciences Laboratory, UC Berkeley, 2004.
Malfaz, M, Gonzalez, A. G., Barber, R. and Salichs, M. A.,
A Biologically Inspired Architecture for an Autonomous
and Social Robot, IEEE Transactions On Autonomous
Mental Development, Vol. 3, No. 3, September 2011.
Radkhah, K., Lens, T., Seyfarth, A. and Stryk, O. V, On The
Influence of Elastic Actuation and Monoarticular Structures
in Biologically Inspired Bipedal Robots, Proceedings of the
2010 3rd IEEE RAS & EMBS International Conference on
Biomedical Robotics and BioMechatronics, The University
of Tokyo, Tokyo, Japan, September 26-29, 2010.
Radkhah, K., Kurowski, S. and Stryk, O. V, Design
Considerations for a Biologically Inspired Compliant FourLegged Robot, Proceedings of the 2009 IEEE International
Conference on Robotics and Biomimetics, December 19 -23,
2009, Guilin, China.
William A. Lewinger, W.A. and Quinn, R.D., A Small,
Autonomous,
Agile
Robot
with
an
on-board,
Neurobiologically-based Control System, 2009 IEEE/RSJ
International Conference on Intelligent Robots and
SystemsOctober 11-15, 2009 St. Louis, USA.