http://phys.org/electronics-news/robotics/ en-us Phys.Org provides the latest news on robotics, robots, robotics sciences and technology science. (Phys.org) -- For several years, roboticists have been working out ways to get a group of robots to perform synchronized activities as demonstrated most often in dance routines. It’s not just about trying to create humanoid machines that can better entertain us though, it’s about getting them to perform simple small scale synchronized activities so that a means can be found to scale up such activities so that robots of the future can work together to autonomously accomplish certain goals that have been defined by their human masters. To that end, MIT researchers Patrick Bechon and Jean-Jacques Slotine have been studying ways to mimic so called quorum sensing, which some organisms use to figure out how many of their own kind are around, and then to perform actions based on it. The two have applied this principal to small dancing robots, to stunning effect. They have written a paper describing what they have learned and posted it on the preprint server arXiv. http://phys.org/news257155711.html Electronics - Robotics Fri, 25 May 2012 09:40:01 EST news257155711 (Phys.org) -- Sooner than you think, we may have robots to tidy up our homes. http://phys.org/news256886510.html Electronics - Robotics Tue, 22 May 2012 06:22:12 EST news256886510 (Phys.org) -- As any gathering of scientists working with robots will suggest, attempts toward perfecting techniques and outcomes of grasping and maneuvering are key issues for researchers working on climbing robots. At this week’s IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation in Saint Paul, Minnesota, the robotics community got to see what a Chinese team has achieved in its presentation of Clothbot. This is a climbing robot that easily climbs up your pants or shirt. The Clothbot is small and lightweight, which did not deter from bloggers’ reactions that the device was “creepy.” System and Design of Clothbot: a Robot for Flexible Clothes Climbing, by Yuanyuan Liu, Xinyu Wu, Huihuan Qian, Duan Zheng, Jianquan Sun and Yangsheng Xu from the Chinese Academy of Sciences and the Chinese University of Hong Kong, was presented Tuesday at the IEEE event. http://phys.org/news256622333.html Electronics - Robotics Sat, 19 May 2012 05:50:01 EST news256622333 (Phys.org) -- When Cornell engineers developed a new type of robot hand that could pick up oddly shaped objects it presented a challenge: It was easy for a human operator to choose the best place to take hold of an object, but an autonomous robot, like the ones we may someday have helping around the home or office, would need a new kind of programming. So they have developed a procedure -- an algorithm -- that allows a robot to learn grasping skills from experience and apply them in new situations. http://phys.org/news255753770.html Electronics - Robotics Wed, 09 May 2012 03:43:22 EST news255753770 (Phys.org) -- One of the big disappointments of the computer age is the distinct lack of robots in our everyday lives. For years we’ve all been teased by the possibilities of robots in SciFi movies and television shows, and still, the only robots in our lives are those little Roomba vacuum cleaners. http://phys.org/news255251620.html Electronics - Robotics Thu, 03 May 2012 08:13:57 EST news255251620 (Phys.org) -- Among the many challenges of designing flying robots is getting them to land gracefully. By taking a cue from birds, a team of engineers has developed a flapping-wing flying robot that can land by perching on a human hand. http://phys.org/news255231161.html Electronics - Robotics Thu, 03 May 2012 05:40:01 EST news255231161 Robots that decompose once they have reached the end of their mission could soon be deployed in the environment, thanks to a Research Project Grant of over £200,000 from the Leverhulme Trust. http://phys.org/news255149195.html Electronics - Robotics Wed, 02 May 2012 03:46:43 EST news255149195 (Phys.org) -- The Mediated Matter Group from the MIT Media Lab is working on a robot that might one day spin its own webs. Project team members are training a robot to weave a web-like architecture, similar to the way a silkworm creates cocoons. The team seeks to train its robot to mimic nature—namely to weave a cocoon like structure. The robot is getting some programming help but eventually the researchers want to see it weaving autonomously, spinning its own web. Latest reports reveal a robot arm deploying yarn-like thread on prearranged hooks. http://phys.org/news254894948.html Electronics - Robotics Sun, 29 Apr 2012 07:10:01 EST news254894948 When industrial robots were first introduced in the early 1960s — initially on automobile assembly lines — computers were still in their infancy, so the robots were designed to perform only the most rigidly predetermined set of repetitive movements. Despite a half-century of exponential growth in computational power, that’s pretty much still the state of industrial robotics. But according to Rodney Brooks, who last year left a tenured position as MIT’s Panasonic Professor of Robotics to focus on his latest company, that may not be true for much longer. http://phys.org/news254551325.html Electronics - Robotics Wed, 25 Apr 2012 06:20:02 EST news254551325 Within the framework of the EU project sFly, researchers at ETH Zurich have developed a new type of flying robot that can be navigated using only on-board cameras and a miniature computer. The micro helicopters require neither GPS nor remote control, thus reaching a new level of autonomy. http://phys.org/news254472266.html Electronics - Robotics Tue, 24 Apr 2012 07:44:55 EST news254472266 (Phys.org) -- South Korea, a nation with a self-proclaimed goal of being a leader in robotics technology has, through the Asian Forum of Corrections (AFC), begun testing the feasibility of using robots as prison guards in an actual prison in Pohang. The robots’ duties, at least initially, are to patrol the halls between cells looking for signs of trouble, and if it finds it, alert the human guards who will take appropriate action. http://phys.org/news253967489.html Electronics - Robotics Wed, 18 Apr 2012 12:20:01 EST news253967489 Renowned author Isaac Asimov died 20 years ago today. Although he wrote more than 500 books, the robot stories he began writing at age 19 are possibly his greatest accomplishment. They have become the starting point for any discussion about how smart robots will behave around humans. http://phys.org/news253178480.html Electronics - Robotics Mon, 09 Apr 2012 08:25:18 EST news253178480 (PhysOrg.com) -- Robot nannies could diminish child care worries for parents of young children. Equipped with alarms and monitoring capabilities to guard children from harm, a robot nanny would let parents leave youngsters at home without a babysitter. http://phys.org/news252918132.html Electronics - Robotics Fri, 06 Apr 2012 08:02:33 EST news252918132 Robot squirrels from the University of California, Davis, are going into rattlesnake country near San Jose, continuing a research project on the interaction between squirrels and rattlesnakes. http://phys.org/news252677353.html Electronics - Robotics Tue, 03 Apr 2012 13:10:00 EST news252677353 Imagine going to a local store, picking out a design for a robot to help with some household chores, and having the device built within a matter of hours. http://phys.org/news252667603.html Electronics - Robotics Tue, 03 Apr 2012 10:40:02 EST news252667603 (PhysOrg.com) -- Boston Dynamics’ video gallery of troop-supporting robots that trek and haul loads has a new addition that is drawing a sea of impressed viewers. It’s the Sand Flea Robot, an eleven-pound wonder that jumps 30 feet high, with a style that stands out in the world of jumping robots. The entertainment value in watching the video is due to the new features that Boston Dynamics injected into it, following the debut of its jumping-robot predecessor, Precision Urban Hopper. http://phys.org/news252215396.html Electronics - Robotics Thu, 29 Mar 2012 05:40:01 EST news252215396 (PhysOrg.com) -- In robotics, three hands are better than one, in the form of a device that has been developed by Intelligent Automation Inc (IAI) for use as troop support. The Multi-Arm Unmanned Ground Vehicle (MA-UGV) is the name of this device from the Rockville, Maryland, R&D company that focuses on AI applications. The three-armed robot can protect troops by lending its handling skills to carry out backback inspections for explosive devices, for example, and, to use the military term, "disarm" Improvised Explosive Devices (IEDs). http://phys.org/news251882594.html Electronics - Robotics Sun, 25 Mar 2012 09:00:01 EST news251882594 (PhysOrg.com) -- Takuya Umedachi has been working for several years to build a robot that can replicate the simple actions of the common slime mold, an organism that can move towards something it desires without benefit of a brain or central nervous system. Now Umedachi and his colleagues at Hiroshima University have built such a robot and have published the specifics of how it works in the journal Advanced Robotics. http://phys.org/news250929798.html Electronics - Robotics Wed, 14 Mar 2012 07:43:32 EST news250929798 (PhysOrg.com) -- In the future according to robotics researchers, robots will likely fight our wars, care for our elderly, babysit our children, and serve and entertain us in a wide variety of situations. But as robotic development continues to grow, one subfield of robotics research is lagging behind other areas: roboethics, or ensuring that robot behavior adheres to certain moral standards. In a new paper that provides a broad overview of ethical behavior in robots, researchers emphasize the importance of being proactive rather than reactive in this area. http://phys.org/news250768869.html Electronics - Robotics Mon, 12 Mar 2012 11:01:35 EST news250768869 (PhysOrg.com) -- In both war and peacetime scenarios, fire in the shipboard environment is serious and frequently results in excessive damage and high repair costs because the fire is not detected or controlled adequately. To help further improve future shipboard firefighting capability, scientists at the Naval Research Laboratory have formed an interdisciplinary team to develop a humanoid robot that could fight fires on the next generation of combatants. A humanoid-type robot was chosen because it was deemed best suited to operate within the confines of an environment that was deigned for human mobility and offered opportunity for other potential warfighting applications within the Navy and Marine Corps. http://phys.org/news250418069.html Electronics - Robotics Thu, 08 Mar 2012 08:34:39 EST news250418069 A robot caricaturist that can draw an accurate likeness of its subject in just three minutes was wowing the crowds on Wednesday at the world's biggest IT fair, but not every customer was satisfied. http://phys.org/news250324075.html Electronics - Robotics Wed, 07 Mar 2012 06:40:01 EST news250324075 (PhysOrg.com) -- Up till now researchers at Boston Dynamics have demonstrated four legged robots that appear meant to carry heavy loads as they tromp through and over rough terrain (e.g. Alpha Dog and Petman, LS3). Now it appears they’ve taken a different approach in looking to build robots that can move fast. And apparently, they mean really fast. In the demo video they show off their new robot named Cheetah breaking the unofficial land speed record by galloping at eighteen miles per hour on a treadmill. Cheetah looks very much like the animal it was named for, even arching it’s back as it picks up speed. But clearly with such a name, the team is aiming much higher. http://phys.org/news250251243.html Electronics - Robotics Tue, 06 Mar 2012 10:14:21 EST news250251243 Tech-savvy TED-goers watched in wonder as flying robots darted through tossed hoops, worked together in swarms and even formed a band to play trademark "James Bond" film theme music. http://phys.org/news249970845.html Electronics - Robotics Sat, 03 Mar 2012 04:20:52 EST news249970845 Snakes! Love them or hate them, everyone can agree they are superb at sliding over complex terrain. Learning the slithery reptiles' tricks can provide valuable tips for designing rescue robots to help locate survivors trapped in rubble after a major disaster strikes.  http://phys.org/news249727710.html Electronics - Robotics Wed, 29 Feb 2012 08:49:06 EST news249727710 (PhysOrg.com) -- Like something straight out of "Star Wars," armies of robots could nimbly be crawling up towers and skyscrapers to make repairs in the not-so-distant future, so humans don't have to. http://phys.org/news249631330.html Electronics - Robotics Tue, 28 Feb 2012 06:02:30 EST news249631330 Robots could one day navigate through constantly changing surroundings with virtually no input from humans, thanks to a system that allows them to build and continuously update a three-dimensional map of their environment using a low-cost camera such as Microsoft’s Kinect. http://phys.org/news248597115.html Electronics - Robotics Thu, 16 Feb 2012 06:45:23 EST news248597115 (PhysOrg.com) -- Last we heard, researchers from Cornell University, the University of Chicago and iRobot had together designed and built a robot “hand” or end effector that worked by taking advantage of the jamming that occurs when air is added to or removed from an enclosed container that holds a material that can be compressed. In this case, the team had filled an ordinary party balloon with dried coffee, which they then affixed to a vacuum pump. Adding air made the coffee pliant enough to allow the balloon to settle around an object. Quickly sucking out the air caused the coffee to compress (jam together) exerting pressure on the object, allowing it to be held and moved around by the gripper which was attached to a programmable robot arm. Now, a subset of that team has added a new feature to their universal gripper, the ability to accurately toss the objects that it picks up. They describe their work in a paper soon to be published in IEEE Transactions on Robotics. http://phys.org/news248519601.html Electronics - Robotics Wed, 15 Feb 2012 09:13:51 EST news248519601 A Japanese-developed robot that mimics the movements of its human controller is bringing the Hollywood blockbuster "Avatar" one step closer to reality. http://phys.org/news248074457.html Electronics - Robotics Fri, 10 Feb 2012 05:34:32 EST news248074457 To improve the next generation of insect-size flying machines, Johns Hopkins engineers have been aiming high-speed video cameras at some of the prettiest bugs on the planet. By figuring out how butterflies flutter among flowers with amazing grace and agility, the researchers hope to help small airborne robots mimic these maneuvers. http://phys.org/news247411651.html Electronics - Robotics Thu, 02 Feb 2012 13:27:51 EST news247411651 (PhysOrg.com) -- The GRASP Lab at the University of Pennsylvania this week released a video that shows their new look in GRASP Lab robotic flying devices. They are now showing flying devices with more complex behavior than before, in a fleet of flying devices that move in packs, navigate spaces with obstacles, flip over and retain position, and carry out formation flying, http://phys.org/news247380035.html Electronics - Robotics Thu, 02 Feb 2012 05:40:01 EST news247380035