Japanese engineers have created a four-legged robot called KLEIYN, which can climb between two vertical walls. Its body contains an additional active joint that acts as a spine and allows it to better brace its legs against the walls, adapting its body length to the width of the gap. In experiments, the robot successfully climbed between walls with a gap width of 80 to 100 centimeters at an average speed of 150 millimeters per second.

Engineers led by Kei Okada of the University of Tokyo decided to create a universal four-legged robot that could run on the ground and climb walls with equal efficiency. Without using additional mechanisms on the legs, this can be achieved in a specific case — for example, when climbing a crack, when the robot climbs between two closely spaced vertical surfaces