DARPA Legged Squad Support System (LS3)

Today's dismounted warfighter can be saddled with more than 100 pounds of gear, resulting in physical strain, fatigue, and degraded performance. To help alleviate the impact of excess weight on troops, DARPA is developing a highly mobile, semi-autonomous four-legged robot, the Legged Squad Support System (LS3). LS3 includes onboard sensors to perceive obstacles in its environment and path-planning capabilities to avoid them. The LS3 platform is designed with the squad in mind and is therefore significantly quieter, faster and has a much higher carrying capacity for longer mission durations than DARPA's earlier mobility technology demonstrator BigDog. The LS3 prototype recently completed its first outdoor assessment, demonstrating mobility by climbing and descending a hill and exercising its perception and autonomous follow-the-leader capabilities.

• Category

  Science & Technology

[TheMerrle]

This Thing scares the crap Out of me...

[Shapechanger]

Superior for what? 30 or 40 minutes till it runs out of batteries? Or superior until it has to quickly move to safety, but can only lumber and not hide. Or do you propose it carries 100 gallons or whatever is required of flammable fuel? Or should it use nuclear power and carry that into the battlefield?

Seriously, until this thing can be powered off of grass and oatmeal like a horse or mule it's a total waste of money.

[Lezah Knight]

Your hard earned tax dollars at work

[Mr.SJayG]

You can probably literally hear that thing a mile away.

[XxdesertdemonxX]

If that isnt one of the single most disturbing and yet holyshitfuckimdying of laughter hilarious things Ive ever seen, idk what is. brb gonna cry in a corner in terror and laugh myself to death.

[ztaylor82]

its alittle loud! the enemy will hear it coming!

[ztaylor82]

judging by its head im guessing it observes it surroundings much like the driver less cars.

[MusicVideosExtreme]

Just out of interest, does the robot observe its surroundings and identify possible hazards (as a detection/ avoidance system) prior to walking on a surface, or does it just 'walk' over any surface and deal with a hazardous situation as it is being experienced?

[I Like Cheesecake]

This reminds me of the robots in Metal Gear Solid.

[FlipEffect1]

But! mules can kick people in then nuts. lets see this robot do that eh! eh!

[Mikki Mouse]

Give it an AI and a weapon system and release it to hunt down political adversaries. Problems solved, right?

[davidhap11]

I didn't hear it coming

-said no one ever.