“The advancement in computer and drone applications is beyond human imagination, affecting and transforming the society, both structurally and socially. Exploitation of computer and drone technology is crucial to humankind in the futuristic world.”
– explains the website for the 2017 International Conference on Computer and Drone Applications (IConDA) which was held at the Damai Beach Resort, Kuching, Sarawak, Malaysia.
Nevertheless, human imagination does stretch to the concept* of a robo-duck. As has been demonstrated* by Saad Bin Abul Kashem, Mujahid Tabassum and Malcolm Chai of the Swinburne University of Technology, Sarawak, Malaysia, who have developed (the idea of *) an amphibious robot having webbed feet as duck.
“A novel design of a duck-inspired amphibious robot is presented in this paper. Webbed feet inspired from the duck is used in the robot. The robot is able to swim, walk, and climb stairs using a single mechanism.”
They presented their findings on the subject at IconDA 2017. See:
‘A novel design of an amphibious robot having webbed feet as duck’
*Note that at this stage, it’s the concept that has been demonstrated, rather than a functioning robo-duck itself :
“In future work, we will test out the design by constructing a functioning prototype. The robot may be redesigned based on the results from the prototype.”
Also see: Ducks feet – the physics