Video: Playing badminton against a robot

August 25, 2025

The GIST Video: Playing badminton against a robot

Lisa Lock

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Andrew Zinin

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A research team from ETH Zurich has taught the four-legged robot ANYmal to play badminton. The system features precise arm movements, quick reflexes and nimble footwork.

How do you get a robot to move, see and hit a shuttlecock back at the same time? A team of researchers at ETH Zurich led by Marco Hutter, professor of robotic systems, have been studying this question. They have developed a control system that coordinates the leg movements, strokes and camera view.

The robot ANYmal tracks the shuttlecock with its two cameras, predicts its flight trajectory and navigates to the right spot to intercept and return shots. In this video, Andrei Cramariuc, a postdoctoral researcher in Hutter's team, explains how they trained the robot and the challenges they had to overcome.

More information: Yuntao Ma et al, Learning coordinated badminton skills for legged manipulators, Science Robotics (2025). DOI: 10.1126/scirobotics.adu3922

Journal information: Science Robotics Provided by ETH Zurich Citation: Video: Playing badminton against a robot (2025, August 25) retrieved 25 August 2025 from https://techxplore.com/news/2025-08-video-playing-badminton-robot.html This document is subject to copyright. Apart from any fair dealing for the purpose of private study or research, no part may be reproduced without the written permission. The content is provided for information purposes only.

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