Robot World News

April 18, 2008

Alabama plans to build multi-million-dollar robotics center

The state of Alabama is planning to build a multi-million-dollar robotics center that will focus on industry training and education. Governor Riley hopes to make Alabama a leader in robot technology education, as well as ensure that industries have the robotics technicians they need for future manufacturing.

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April 17, 2008

New Robots Can Provide Elder Care For Aging Baby Boomers

Baby boomers are set to retire, and robots are ready to help, providing elder care and improving the quality of life for those in need. Researchers at the University of Massachusetts Amherst have developed a robotic assistant that can dial 911 in case of emergencies, remind clients to take their medication, help with grocery shopping and allow a client to talk to loved ones and health care providers.

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April 14, 2008

Bio-inspired robot climbs three-story building

Luckily, RiSE the robot isn't afraid of heights. Looking somewhat like a mutated scorpion - with six legs and 25-50 toes per foot - the robot uses technology inspired by geckos, squirrels, cockroaches, and other natural climbers to scale three-story buildings, among other feats.

Besides climbing, RiSE (which stands for Robots in Scansorial Environments) is the first legged machine capable of untethered locomotion on both the ground and vertical terrain, say its designers.

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April 13, 2008

Robot hawk scares birds from Dutch airport

Birds loitering on the runways at the Schiphol Airport in Amsterdam can present a pest to pilots ready for take-off.

Officials have tried to scare the birds away with everything from laser beams, loudspeakers mimicking bird warning calls, and even specially-trained bird-chasing dogs.

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April 11, 2008

Fully automated 'robot' restaurant opens in Germany

In the southern German town of Nuremberg, diners at 'S Baggers can order, receive, and pay for their food, all without ever having to see a single human waiter. The restaurant is the first fully automated "robot" restaurant in the world, and so far it has been an overwhelming success.

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April 11, 2008

An Interview with Terri the Robot

At the State Science and Engineering last week in Honolulu, a robot named Terri attended to educate young students on science.

Terri (The Educational Resource Robot Initiative) was designed by Conceptual Visions, and can carry on conversations without any outside help.

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April 5, 2008

MIT builds Nexi the emo robot

Researchers in the MIT Media Lab are developing a team of small humanoids that are especially "human."

The robots are built on a platform called "Mobile, Dexterous, and Social" (MDS), meaning the little creatures can move around, manipulate objects, and interact with humans. MIT is collaborating with Xitome Design and UMASS Amherst on the MDS development.

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April 1, 2008

How do you talk to a robot?

In order for robots to be our servants, we must know how to tell them what to do.

The most natural language for humans is, of course, speaking in words. By choosing those words carefully, we might be able to talk to robots in a way that they too can understand.

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March 31, 2008

TUG robot chugs through children's hospitals

"Express train with an express delivery!" says the train conductor of the newly remodeled TUG robot. TUG was designed to move equipment and toys throughout hospitals, allowing employees to focus more on the patients.

Originally, TUG was a simple gray robot cart. But recently, the robot received a makeover and now looks like a brightly colored train with a conductor wearing an outfit from the store The Gap. San Francisco-based Gensler Architects designed the train cover, supported by a $100,000 grant from Aethon Corp., which manufactures the robot.

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March 31, 2008

Humanoid leg could help amputees walk better

Researchers from the Institute of Field Robotics are using their knowledge of robot leg design in order to help human amputees walk easier.

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March 28, 2008

iPhone, iRobot, and Wii merge for Army applications

Using a joystick to control a military Packbot is difficult. Controlling the bomb-sniffing robot while simultaneously analyzing the sensor data that gets transmitted back is even harder.

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March 27, 2008

First 'technosexual' declares his love for a robot

"Zoltan," a semi-anonymous guy from Georgia, doesn't like guys or girls. Instead, he likes robots.

He recently talked with Gizmodo in a first-of-its-kind interview about his long-term, monogamous relationship with Alice. Alice is a robot that offers Zoltan physical, mental, and emotional company. And he wouldn't have it any other way.

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March 24, 2008

World's Biggest Underwater Robot weighs in at 55 tons

The first UT-1 Ultra Trencher, built by Soil Machine Dynamics in the UK, has been delivered to CTC Marine Projects, another UK company that plans to use the robot to bury oil and gas pipelines at the bottom of the sea floor.

At 55 tons ("the size of a small house," says its specs), the Ultra Trencher holds the title of being the largest underwater robot to date. Its dimensions are 25 x 25 x 18 feet (7.8 x 7.8 x 5.6 meters). With that heft, it has a top speed of about 3 knots under the water.

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March 22, 2008

Surgeons to control Da Vinci robot with eye movements

Around the world, the surgical robot Da Vinci is enabling doctors to perform less invasive and more precise surgeries. Da Vinci has been used in tumor removal, heart repair, and other operations.

Now, researchers from Imperial College London are further improving the robot and human's viewing consule in several new ways.

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March 21, 2008

Climbing robot to investigate Martian geology

Researchers from Stanford University have built a wall climbing robot that could climb vertical cliffs on Mars, for the purpose of exploring rocks and minerals in currently unreachable locations.

The climbing robot, called "Capuchin," has two arms and two legs, and climbs a typical-looking rock wall similar to how a human would approach the challenge.

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March 19, 2008

Man Builds Robot to Kill Him

An 81-year-old man from Burleigh Heads, Australia, downloaded plans to build a killer robot from the Internet, built the complex machine, and then used it to kill himself in his driveway.

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March 19, 2008

Life-like BigDog robot walks like a real (headless) dog

Boston Dynamics has released new footage of its four-legged versatile robot called BigDog. The headless, dog-like robot can trot up wooded terrain, walk on ice, and even keep its balance when kicked.

Boston Dynamics built BigDog with a $10 million grant from the US military. The robot is designed to carry heavy equipment over rough terrain.

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March 18, 2008

Robot car racing could occur in Qatar

Researchers from Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) and its branch campus CMU in Qatar (CMUQ) are thinking about holding robot car races in Qatar. The robot races would hopefully encourage computer scientists and engineers to develop new technology for the races, which could be adapted into cars in the future.

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March 11, 2008

Robot Rips 1,000 CDs in a Day

A start-up company in Auckland, New Zealand, called Mediashifter has a workforce of three employees and one robot. It's the latter that does most of the dirty work for the music conversion company, though.

Humans load CDs into a gigantic robot carousel, and the machine goes about ripping up to a thousand CDs per day, unattended.

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March 10, 2008

Robot Gets Soft Arms, Chest to Gently Carry Old People

One of the most physically demanding tasks for nurses who work with the elderly is moving them around. Sometimes wheel chairs can help, but other times, weak individuals must be carried short distances (such as from the bed to the bathroom). And in emergency situations where nurses aren't around, a robot could potentially pick an individual up in its arms.

RI-MAN the robot, designed by Toshiharu Mukai, Masaki Onishi, Tadashi Odashima, Shinya Hirano, and Zhiwei Luo from the Bio-mimetic Control Research Center at RIKEN in Nagoya, Japan, aims to help elderly people in their daily lives.

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March 8, 2008

Robot snakes climb pipes, walls, and legs

Researchers at Carnegie Mellon University have designed snake robots that use cyclic internal motions to propel themselves forward, up, down, and just about any other direction.

The researchers have developed several prototypes of the snake robots, which have names like Pepperoni, Breadstick, and Detroit. The snakes are all about three feet long and made of aluminum modules with 2"x2" cross sections.

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March 6, 2008

Robots Link Up to Contain Oil Spills

Hexagonal robots as tall as a human could be tossed into the water surrounding an accidental oil spill, and stop the slick mess from spreading further into the ocean, saving wildlife and the environment. Once contained, cleaning crews could remove the oil from the water.

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March 3, 2008

Artist Uses Robot Hunting Trophies to Question Life's Value

Artist France Cadet, a robotics teacher at the Aix-en-Provence School of Art in Marseilles, has recently designed an intriguing piece of work: hunting trophies of robotic animals.

Her display consists of a wall of 11 trophies, each mounted with the head of a robotic animal - the animals most commonly used as wall trophies, including a variety of cats, an impala, zebra, and warthog.

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February 27, 2008

Robots Help Us Understand Human Personality

Do you like humanoids, or do you prefer more mechanical-looking robots? Your choice may reveal something about your personality, according to researchers at the University of Hertfordshire Science and Technology Research Institute.

The group's recent study found that extroverts tend to enjoy the company of humanoids, while introverts are more likely to tolerate mechanical robots.

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February 25, 2008

India to launch its first consumer robot

Indian company Gridbots is planning to release the country's first major consumer robot in the next few months, with high hopes that the mechanical servant will make a big splash.

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February 25, 2008

Comics Help Students Understand Robotics

In an attempt to reach out to a younger generation of engineers, Professor Ernie Hall of the University of Cincinnati is using comic books to teach the intricacies of robotics systems.

The director of the Center for Robotics at UC, Hall says that the comic books are helpful in explaining technical points for college students in his robot control class.

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February 23, 2008

Robot Follows its 'Nose'

When it comes to the ability to sense chemicals, robots have nothing on sharp-nosed insects. Although robots can track chemicals both in air and underwater using man-made sensors, they're extremely slow at it.

Researchers David J. Harvey, Tien-Fu Lu, and Michael A. Keller from the University of Adelaide in Australia are trying to make robots much faster at tracking chemicals.

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