Boston Dynamics has just updated its YouTube channel with some new videos. One of them is an update on Atlas. Another is an update on LS3. And the third is this: WildCat, a totally new quadruped robot based on Cheetah, and out of nowhere, there's this video of it bounding and galloping around outdoors, untethered, at up to 16 miles an hour.
Scientists in the US have created a robot the size of a fly that is able to perform the agile manoeuvres of the ubiquitous insects.This "robo-fly", built from carbon fibre, weighs a fraction of a gram and has super-fast electronic "muscles" to power its wings.
Cambridge, Mass. - May 2, 2013 - In the very early hours of the morning, in a Harvard robotics laboratory last summer, an insect took flight. Half the size of a paperclip, weighing less than a tenth of a gram, it leapt a few inches, hovered for a moment on fragile, flapping wings, and then sped along a preset route through the air.
Like a proud parent watching a child take its first steps, graduate student Pakpong Chirarattananon immediately captured a video of the fledgling and emailed it to his adviser and colleagues at 3 a.m.—subject line, "Flight of the RoboBee."
"I was so excited, I couldn't sleep," recalls Chirarattananon, co-lead author of a paper published this week in Science.
The RoboBees project "provides a common motivation for scientists and engineers across the university to build smaller batteries, to design more efficient control systems, and to create stronger, more lightweight materials," says Harvard engineering professor Robert J. Wood. "You might not expect all of these people to work together: vision experts, biologists, materials scientists, electrical engineers. What do they have in common? Well, they all enjoy solving really hard problems." (Credit: Kevin Ma and Pakpong Chirarattananon, Harvard University.)
The demonstration of the first controlled flight of an insect-sized robot is the culmination of more than a decade's work, led by researchers at the Harvard School of Engineering and Applied Sciences (SEAS) and the Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering at Harvard.
"This is what I have been trying to do for literally the last 12 years," says Robert J. Wood, Charles River Professor of Engineering and Applied Sciences at SEAS, Wyss Core Faculty Member, and principal investigator of the National Science Foundation-supported RoboBee project. "It's really only because of this lab's recent breakthroughs in manufacturing, materials, and design that we have even been able to try this. And it just worked, spectacularly well."
[...] MIT announced a new project, “An Expedition in Computing Printable Programmable Machines,” that aims to give everyone a chance to have his or her own robot.
It currently takes years to produce, program and design a functioning robot, and is an extremely expensive process, involving hardware and software design, machine learning and vision, and advanced programming techniques. The new project would automate the process of producing functional 3-D devices and allow individuals to design and build functional robots from materials as easily accessible as a sheet of paper.
“Our vision is to develop an end-to-end process; specifically, a compiler for building physical machines that starts with a high level of specification of function, and delivers a programmable machine for that function using simple printing processes,” said Rus.
"This research revolutionizes the design and manufacturing of robots, with a profound potential impact on society," says Ralph Wachter, a program director in the NSF Directorate for Computer and Information Science and Engineering. "It would remove barriers to manufacturing robots, making it possible for average citizens to customize and manufacture their own robots to meet their needs. This opens the door to great possibilities."
Today, the Silicon Valley startup is announcing a new line of Wave Glider robots propelled by waves and solar power. The Wave Glider SV3 is the world’s first unmanned ocean robot to use this kind of hybrid technology, according to an official statement from the company.
Sunnyvale, Calif.-based Liquid Robotics gained a spot in history when it announced in December that Papa Mau, one of its data-collecting second-generation Wave Gliders, had floated more than 9,000 miles across the Pacific Ocean.
Wave Gliders can collect data on weather in remote locations. They can be used to monitor hurricanes, predict tsunamis, and monitor rare marine life. Wave Gliders collect data on temperature, winds, humidity, wind gusts, water temperature, water color, and water composition. They can also take pictures. These robots are gathering a lot of observational data about climate change, ocean acidification, fisheries management, hurricane and tsunami warnings, and exploration — but in a green way.
The Wave Glider SV3 is at the intersection of two others: robotics and renewable energy. Senior Navy officials are hot to create an undersea robot that can last great distances, performing missions that range from aquatic surveillance to mine destruction to submarine hunting. Problem is, no engineer has figured out how to give the robots a sufficiently long-lasting fuel source to power cross-oceanic transit — a necessity, since the robot isn’t going to swim into port to refuel. Which ties into another Navy necessity: immunizing its budget from the fluctuations in fuel costs, especially as its efforts at using biofuels ran into major congressional obstruction.
First introduced in 2009, Wave Gliders have since traveled more than 300,000 nautical miles, set a world record for longest distance traveled by an autonomous vehicle, and been deployed on more than 100 customer missions ranging from the Arctic and Australia, to the Canary Islands and Loch Ness.
The SV Series represents the next generation of Wave Glider technology and includes the Wave Glider SV2 with a compatible growth path to the high-end Wave Glider SV3. Customers can choose the Wave Glider that best fits their mission and budgetary requirements, or mix and match for complex operations.
Download the Wave Glider SV Series data sheet (pdf)
A superorganism is an organism consisting of many organisms. [...] The technical definition of a superorganism is "a collection of agents which can act in concert to produce phenomena governed by the collective,"[1] phenomena being any activity "the hive wants" such as ants collecting food or bees choosing a new nest site.
Robot swarms can mimic how ant colonies navigate complex mazes relatively mindlessly, researchers have found ― knowledge that could help to improve designs for manmade transportation networks.
Scientists are fascinated by ant colonies because they can form collectives called "superorganisms" that function as single organisms do. Investigation into how ants behave has revealed more about how such group behavior arises, and some researchers are using that knowledge to help build smarter robot swarms, said Simon Garnier, a scientist who studies animal behavior at the New Jersey Institute of Technology.
This animated character is being rendered in real-time on current video card hardware, using standard bone animation. ...
Mashable asks the pertinent, philosophical question: Does this next-generation animation cross the so-called "uncanny valley?"
The term was coined in 1970 by the Japanese roboticist Masahiro Mori. He said humans can relate to robots — think R2-D2 — but once they get too humanlike, but not close enough — think the animated Angelina Jolie in Beowulf — they feel disgust. That disgust — that "uncanny valley" — subsides at the other side: when the robot is indistinguishable from reality.
So, have we crossed that valley with this animation?
We believe this technology brings current generation characters, into next generation life. At 180 fps in a Geforce GTX 680.
The team behind this technology consists on Javier Von Der Pahlen (Director of R&D), Etienne Danvoye (Technical Director), Bernardo Antoniazzi (Techical Art Director), Zbyněk Kysela (Modeler and Texture Artist), Mike Eheler (Programming & Support) and me (Real-Time Graphics R&D).
You have a teaser of the slides here:
Next-Generation-Character-Rendering-Teaser.pptx
Telenoid is a child-sized telepresence robot through which users can interact with others from a distance. Created in collaboration with Osaka University and Advanced Telecommunications Research Institute International (ATR), Telenoid is a tool for investigating "the essential elements for representing and transferring humanlike presence," according to Ishiguro and his team.
Features of Telenoid R1 include:
- A novel minimalistic design that can effectively represent human presence
- Soft and pleasant body
- Low cost due to decreased numbers of actuators
(Telenoid R1:9、Geminoid™ HI-1:50、Geminoid™ F:12)- Small-size body and simple internal structure by use of electric (DC) motors
- Easy teleoperation based on the teleoperation technology developed by ATR
Could a robot that sings jazz be the key to understanding and harnessing robot intelligence?
That is the hopes of researcher Antonio Chella at the University of Palermo, Italy.
Antonio Chella at the University of Palermo, Italy, is working with a Telenoid robot, developed by the Hiroshi Ishiguro Laboratory in Japan (pictured). To start with, the Telenoid will be trained to mimic the movements and simple sounds made by a human singer, as well as associate parts of music with different emotional states. Chella then plans to see if the robot can use these associations to improvise - choosing movements and vocalisations that complement its human duet partner.
Intelligence is often defined as the ability to find connections between existing entities - understanding that a key goes in a lock, for instance. But Chella suggests that a conscious organism should be able to go a step further and introduce novel connections - between, say, musical phrases - that result in the creation of something new. That, in essence, is the idea behind improvisation.
Jazz musicians interviewed by Chella talked of having a mental library of musical phrases that they were able to combine in new ways when prompted by other musicians. Importantly, however, this combination happens in a state that is "similar in a sense to dreaming", he says. "Not really conscious, but not unconscious." Chella wants to replicate these states in a machine. "Consciousness could be linked to these moments of combination," he says.
It takes on chores such as pruning and de-suckering - removing unproductive young shoots - while collecting valuable data on the health and vigour of the soil, fruit and vine stocks.
[...] Wall-Ye, a vineyard-tending robot being developed in France. Wall-Ye costs a hefty €25,000 (US $32,000), but for that price, according to the AFP, it can "move from vine to vine, recognise plant features, capture and record data, memorise each vine, synchronise six cameras and guide its arms to wield tools." The solar-powered Wall-Ye can prune 600 vines per day and even collect data on soil and fruit. It even has an anti-theft device that causes the hard drive to self-destruct if the GPS detects it's been removed from the vineyard.[...]
Sales demonstrations are about to begin, and big name French vintners like Bordeaux's First Growth Chateau Mouton-Rothschild have offered their vineyards as a venue for the 20-kilogramme (44-pound) robot to put on its show.
Wall-Ye draws on tracking technology, artificial intelligence and mapping to move from vine to vine, recognise plant features, capture and record data, memorise each vine, synchronise six cameras and guide its arms to wield tools.
White with red trim, 50 centimetres (20 inches) tall and 60 wide, it also has an in-built security mechanism is designed to thwart would-be robot snatchers.
"It has a GPS, and if it finds itself in a non-designated vineyard, it won't start. It also has a gyroscope so it knows if it's been lifted off the ground," Millot said.
The Legged Squad Support System (LS3) is a rough-terrain robot developed by Boston Dynamics with funding from DARPA and the US Marine Corps. It is designed to carry 400 lbs of payload and travel 20 miles without refueling. LS3 has sensors that let it follow a human leader while avoiding obstacles in the terrain. For more information visit www.BostonDynamics.com.
LS3 seeks to demonstrate that a highly mobile, semi-autonomous legged robot can carry 400 lbs of a squad’s load, follow squad members through rugged terrain and interact with troops in a natural way, similar to a trained animal and its handler.
The LS3 program goal is to develop a robot that will go through the same terrain the squad goes through without hindering the squad’s mission. The robot could also serve as a mobile auxiliary power source to the squad, so troops can recharge batteries for radios and handheld devices while on patrol.
Related Programs
Boston Dynamics builds advanced robots with remarkable behavior: mobility, agility, dexterity and speed. We use sensor-based controls and computation to unlock the capabilities of complex mechanisms. Our world-class development teams take projects from initial concept to proof-of-principle prototyping to build-test-build engineering, to field testing and low-rate production.
Boston Dynamics has assembled an extraordinary team to develop the LS3, including engineers and scientists from Boston Dynamics, Bell Helicopter, AAI Corporation, Carnegie Mellon, the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, and Woodward HRT.
Earthworms creep along the ground by alternately squeezing and stretching muscles along the length of their bodies, inching forward with each wave of contractions. Snails and sea cucumbers also use this mechanism, called peristalsis, to get around, and our own gastrointestinal tracts operate by a similar action, squeezing muscles along the esophagus to push food to the stomach.
Now researchers at MIT, Harvard University and Seoul National University have engineered a soft autonomous robot that moves via peristalsis, crawling across surfaces by contracting segments of its body, much like an earthworm. The robot, made almost entirely of soft materials, is remarkably resilient: Even when stepped upon or bludgeoned with a hammer, the robot is able to inch away, unscathed.
Sangbae Kim, the Esther and Harold E. Edgerton Assistant Professor of Mechanical Engineering at MIT, says such a soft robot may be useful for navigating rough terrain or squeezing through tight spaces.
Researchers created the “artificial muscle” using nickel and titanium, producing a soft, flexible, mesh-like tube that stretches and contracts with heat.
Perhaps the most remarkable thing about Meshworm is its ability to withstand some pretty rough treatment. Clobber most robots with a hammer and it will likely result in some sparks, puffs of smoke and a major malfunction. Clobber Meshworm and it just continues crawling along as if nothing’s happened – as demonstrated in the video below. It can also survive someone stepping on it.
Resilient Robots for the U.S. Military
Meshworm has the ability to survive a frightening degree of misuse, and that provides one clue into DARPA’s interest in the new technology.
As described by writer Jennifer Chu, the field of soft robotics is of growing interest to engineers. With little or no need for bulky hardware, soft robots are more durable and lend themselves to miniaturization more easily than their mechanical counterparts.
In terms of military purpose, soft robots like Meshworm could be air-dropped, launched or thrown over relatively long distances, land without damage, and set about crawling silently around, squeezing through tight openings and conducting surveillance.
Scientists Create Worm-like Robot That Can Inch Along the Ground
The Meshworm uses peristalsis, contracting and expanding different muscle segments, to inch across the ground. Image via MIT
But there might well be more benign uses as well. Kellar Autumn, a professor at Lewis and Clark College who studies biomechanics in robotics, told MIT that devices similar to the Meshworm could someday be useful for a wide range of applications, including both consumer technology and medical devices such endoscopes, implants and prosthetics. “Even though the robot’s body is much simpler than a real worm—it has only a few segments—it appears to have quite impressive performance,” Autumn said. “I predict that in the next decade we will see shape-changing artificial muscles in many products, such as mobile phones, portable computers and automobiles.”
Judson Laippley’s ‘Evolution Of Dance’ has just under 200 million views making it one of the most watched YouTube videos online. Valentin Bertrand of Aldebaran Robotics recreates the ‘Evolution of Dance’ by programming a NAO robot to perform Judson Laipply’s dance moves. [...]
US experts have developed what they say are the most biologically-accurate robotic legs yet.Writing in the Journal of Neural Engineering, they said the work could help understanding of how babies learn to walk - and spinal-injury treatment.
They created a version of the message system that generates the rhythmic muscle signals that control walking.
A UK expert said the work was exciting because the robot mimics control and not just movement.
We are interested in understanding biological movement, vision and intelligence.
We use non-traditional methods. We build simulations or models of systems in software and test them in hardware to try to understand their biological counterparts. This requires the integration of a large amount of information across the biological sciences and then the implementation of electrical and mechanical engineering techniques.
A secondary goal is to advance robotic theory. We often try to translate understanding derived from biology into new robotic methods that offer solutions to real world problems.
Dr. M. Anthony Lewis, Director of the Robotics and Neural Systems Lab at the University of Arizona, and Theresa J. Klein (PhD student) have been working on a biarticulate muscle leg model. In a paper published in 2008 (available at the lab’s website), they describe how motors pulled on stiff, tendon-like Kevlar straps to reproduce the action of key muscle groups.
Their new biped robot features an improved leg design that models even more muscles. And it’s already walking (though it relies on a babywalker-like support for balance). It stands 55 cm (22″) tall with the legs fully extended and weighs approximately 4.5 kg (10 lbs).
Like many roboticists, Lewis and Klein looked to nature for inspiration. Humans have a central pattern generator (CPG) in their spinal cord’s lumbar region. The CPG is a neural network producing rhythmic signals that allow the body to generate the step cycle needed for locomotion. The CPG creates and controls these signals based on information it gathers from the legs, which indicate, for example, the slope and solidity of a surface as they walk.
Lewis and Klein’s robot features the simplest form of a CPG—just two neurons that fire signals alternately to produce a rhythm, as well as load sensors that determine force in the limb when each leg presses against a stepping surface. This setup is similar to the mental mechanism that allows human babies to learn to walk—a pair of neurons enables their little legs to work in rhythm with practice.
Each leg of the university’s robot consists of a hip, knee and ankle moved by nine muscle actuators. Muscle contraction is mimicked by rotating the motor to pull on Kevlar straps. Each muscle strap features a load sensor that models a tendon in a human leg, sensing muscle tension when a muscle is contracted and sending signals to the brain about how much force is being exerted and where.
Researchers at Georgia Tech's Center for Music Technology have injected a little fun into robotics with their newest creation. Their one-foot-tall 'Shimi' robot is a smart-phone enabled DJ that gets into the music with you.
True to its name, Shimi dances to the beat. Docking your iPhone or Android into the robot allows it access to your music library, where it can pick the music to pump up your party. Shimi can read body language, so all you have to do to let it know you don't like a song is shake your head in front of it.
Shimi creator Professor Gil Weinberg, director of Georgia Tech's Center for Music Technology, has founded a start-up company, named Tovbot. Plans are for the robot to be available to consumers by the 2013 holiday season.
If a user taps of claps a beat,v Shimi analyzes it, scans the phone's musical library and immediately plays the song that best matches the suggestion. Once the music starts, Shimi dances to the rhythm.[...]
The robot's 'eyes' can also follow people round a room and ensure that speakers are aimed at them.
Shimi, a musical companion developed by Georgia Tech's Center for Music Technology, recommends songs, dances to the beat and keeps the music pumping based on listener feedback.
Shimi is essentially a docking station with a ‘brain’ powered by an Android phone. Once docked, the robot gains the sensing and musical generation capabilities of the user's mobile device. In other words, if there's an ‘app for that,’ Shimi is ready.
For instance, by using the phone's camera and face-detecting software, the bot can follow a listener around the room and position its ‘ears,’ or speakers, for optimal sound.
[...] It's about time engineers built a robot "with the intention to party," says Lee Rannals at RedOrbit. "A dancing robot that follows you around is pretty cool," says Elise Moreau at Slashgear, "but it looks like Shimi still has a bit of growing up to do." Call me when they've built apps that let you shake your head or wave your hand to get the bot to skip lousy songs. Well, "I'm not a huge fan of desktop toys that flap around," says Technabob. But there's something endearing about watching a little robotic DJ "get its groove on to your music." See for yourself:
A designer-artist couple from Portland, Ore., figured out how to create walking robotic animals — an elephant, a rhino and a giraffe — using nothing but paper.
Lucas Ainsworth, an industrial designer working at Intel, and Alyssa Hamel, a public-school art teacher, took their inspiration from Dutch artist Theo Jansen. His Strandbeest (beach animal) creations are giant mechanical contraptions — in part made from waste, including plastic bottles — that harness wind power to walk on their own.
The kits were prototyped, developed and are currently made using a laser cutter, but it takes over two hours and expensive laser-time to build each kit. Now that the designs are done, we are launching a Kickstarter project to cast the patterns onto die-cut-tools at a local cardboard manufacturing facility in Portland, OR. Using a die-press, the time-per-kit comes way down. That means we will be able to share the Kinetic Creatures, using sustainable materials and 100% local manufacturing, with hundreds of Makers and art students.
Kinetic Creatures also...
encourage people to build with their hands, minds and imagination. Use sustainable and recyclable materials and support local manufacturing.
Kinetic Creatures takes a complex mechanical linkage, popularized in Theo Jansen’s Strandbeest, and makes it accessible through an easy assembly and friendly cardboard form.
A collaboration between Alyssa- a Visual Arts Teacher and Artist and Lucas- an Industrial Designer, the Kinetic Creatures are intended to encourage building and thinking creatively at home and in the classroom.
The Segway a bit too big for you? Or require a bit too much standing for your liking? Well, Honda’s got an interesting-looking solution in the works — the Honda UNI-CUB.
Called a “personal mobility device,” the UNI-CUB looks like a unicycle sans the cycle or wheel part. So how does it work?
Sit in the saddle and Honda’s Omni Traction Drive System lets you control the speed and direction by shifting your weight. Yep, no hands.
Honda Motor Co. unveiled the new UNI-CUB personal mobility device, designed for harmony with people. Featuring a compact design and comfortable saddle, UNI-CUB offers the same freedom of movement in all directions that a person enjoys while walking.
Representing the evolution of the U3-X personal mobility device that Honda announced in 2009, UNI-CUB features Honda’s proprietary balance control technology and the world’s first omni-directional driving wheel system (Honda Omni Traction Drive System). These technologies allow the rider to control speed, move in any direction, turn and stop, all simply by shifting his or her weight. Since the rider can freely move forward, backward, side-to-side and diagonally, he or she can quickly and easily maneuver among other people.
[...]
The balance control technology of UNI-CUB is part of the Honda Robotics family of technologies, which originates with Honda’s research into humanoid robots, including the world-famous ASIMO.
Going forward, Honda will continue its proactive research and development of next-generation mobility technologies, aiming always to offer more and more people the joy and fun that comes from freedom of movement.
