# University of Toronto develops flexible foot pad for one-legged hopping robot Hopcopter, improving performance on sand and ice

- Source: Tech Xplore Robotics
- Published: 2026-10-28T15:40:04.000Z
- RoboHot: https://robohot.news/en/items/wb0o8dbx1exspouj6zk8bpqxp
- Original: https://techxplore.com/news/2026-10-flexible-foot-pad-enables-legged.html

## Summary

A University of Toronto engineering team has developed a flexible foot pad for the one-legged hopping robot Hopcopter, enabling it to hop on difficult terrain such as sand and ice. By enlarging the contact area, using a spherical joint that tilts with the terrain, a rubber band for return, and short spikes on the bottom for grip, the pad reduces takeoff error by up to 66%, improves efficiency by up to 64%, and cuts cross-terrain performance variation by 84%. The related paper was published in Advanced Intelligent Systems; the team's next step is to develop autonomous navigation, targeting scenarios such as search and rescue, pipeline inspection, and mining area inspection.