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Dynamics Aware Quadrupedal Locomotion via Intrinsic Dynamics Head

Summary

A novel training framework for quadrupedal locomotion is proposed, incorporating an Intrinsic Dynamics (ID) Head that learns state-to-torque dynamics alongside the control policy. This enables the policy to reason about physical dynamics, improving efficiency and stability. Simulation and real-robot experiments show significant gains: torque efficiency +16.8%, action rate -18.6%, mechanical power -12.8%, and safe torque occupancy +6.4%.

SourcearXiv RoboticsAuthor: Aman Arora, Nalini Ratha
Dynamics Aware Quadrupedal Locomotion via Intrinsic Dynamics Head
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[2605.01227] Dynamics Aware Quadrupedal Locomotion via Intrinsic Dynamics Head

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Computer Science > Robotics

arXiv:2605.01227 (cs)

[Submitted on 2 May 2026]

Title:Dynamics Aware Quadrupedal Locomotion via Intrinsic Dynamics Head

Authors:Aman Arora, Nalini Ratha

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Abstract:Quadrupedal locomotion plays a critical role in enabling agile, versatile movement across complex terrains. Understanding and estimating the underlying physical dynamics are essential for achieving efficient and stable quadrupedal locomotion. We propose a novel training framework for quadrupedal locomotion that enables the Control Policy to understand and reason about physical dynamics. In simulation, we concurrently train an Intrinsic Dynamics (ID) Head that learns state-to-torque dynamics alongside the Control Policy, and we define a dynamics reward enabled by the ID Head that encourages the Policy toward more predictable dynamical behavior. We also provide a mechanism to tune the learned dynamics in the resulting Policy by controlling the training coefficients of the ID Head. Our simulation experiments show that this mechanism drives convergence to better optima across a wide range of standard quadrupedal locomotion rewards, yielding more efficient and smoother policies. Our real-robot experiments demonstrate sim-to-real transfer of these improvements, with significant gains in torque efficiency (16.8%), action rate (18.6%), and mechanical power (12.8%), while improving safe torque occupancy by 6.4%.

Comments: 8 pages, 6 figures

Subjects:

Robotics (cs.RO)

Cite as: arXiv:2605.01227 [cs.RO]

(or arXiv:2605.01227v1 [cs.RO] for this version)

https://doi.org/10.48550/arXiv.2605.01227

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arXiv-issued DOI via DataCite

Submission history

From: Aman Arora [view email] [v1] Sat, 2 May 2026 03:50:54 UTC (5,965 KB)

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Key points

  • Introduces an Intrinsic Dynamics (ID) Head trained concurrently with the control policy to learn state-to-torque mappings.
  • Defines a dynamics reward that encourages more predictable behavior from the policy.
  • Offers a mechanism to tune learned dynamics via training coefficients.
  • Real-robot experiments demonstrate successful sim-to-real transfer with substantial performance improvements.

Highlights and analysis are generated automatically and may contain errors. Check the original source.