New bioinspired robot flies, rolls, walks, and more

The tradeoff is presumably higher cost and less reliability. Additionally, less ability to carry mass than if it just flew.

I can't imagine a way this would be too useful but obviously a lack of imagination isn't proof..

Although I don't think militaries would really rely on wheeled transportation much for drones, though perhaps reduced battery drain in the wheeled on-ground mode is a selling point for longevity in the field. It certainly has many other uses though.

EDIT:

What would be really neat ; putting little inflatable pontoons on those skids.

That thing is awesome, however, with the hard plastic wheels, and the way it scapes them back into forward wheels, I feel like this is a dead-in-the-water-flaw.

Imagine trying to scrape the wheels back into place on sand, or any other terrain obsticals that will prevent the pulling the wheels in.

Instead, it should move the pivot joint and allow for the wheels to be lifted up, gull-wing-style, then straightened and then placed down like feet, lift the body, then drive....

That thing will die in water without pontoons (the wheels/tyres maybe) -- and also not relying on scraping hard Big-Wheel stile plastice tyres along whatever surface.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MnrJzXM7a6o&t=130s

They have time, because they accept lower remuneration for many years to work on things they are interested in.

All of this research has to get funding from somewhere. Presumably the funding bodies decided this was a potentially useful thing to fund.

So I'm not sure what your complaint is really. Are you unhappy because you personally don't see the value in some research? That it just looks too much fun to be "real" work?

The latter is interesting, but doesn't constitute "walking", especially when the point of walking (as a preferred method of locomotion) is to be able to step over obstacles or onto platforms like stairs, which rolling on two wheels obviously can't accomplish.

And the answer for these projects usually: the military complex, possibly through one or two levels of indirection of government/federal grants.

“…used by both Russia and Ukraine for surveillance and for delivering bombs, goes for around US $2,000. You can get 55,000 of them for the price of a single F-35”

https://spectrum.ieee.org/amp/drone-warfare-ukraine-26602790...