Author Archive
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Segway RMP bots used for sniper target practice
These target bots from Marathon Robotics, have Segway RMP bases with half-mannequins on top that respond to being shot by toppling over. The robots are programmed to wander around randomly, and when one goes down, the rest scatter. This unique system was designed in conjunction with the Australi...
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Tele-operated Android “Geminoid F”
Have you seen the first Geminoid robot (the HI-1) which was developed to look like its creator, Hiroshi Ishiguro? Probably you were not that interested to learn more about that robot because he does not, well, looked very pleasing to the eyes. But the second creation of Mr Hiroshi Ishiguro will ...
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Nokia N900 Controls LEGO NXT Robot via Twitter
Thinking out of the box, some researchers or more-like called "hackers" just can't get enough of their Nokia N900 cell phones. But this is something that I would also perhaps do with my spare time, tweaking my own cell phone to make it useful for some other controls. Just like this technology...
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Berkeley’s PR2 Robot Performs Simple Folding
UC Berkeley's own Assistant Professor, Pieter Abbeel has developed a household robot that will definitely offer a great help at home. What it does? Simple folding of towels. To us humans, it may seem easy, but mind you when you several clothes or towels to fold, it may be tiresome or may not lik...
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Device That Allows A Robot To Mimic A Person’s Moves
The WIND (Wireless Intelligent Networked Device) permits robot control with the use of a SiP (System in Package) chip, packing the full functionality of a personal computer onto a single semiconductor. Recently presented by the Engineers from Future Robotics Technology Center (fuRo), a divisi...
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Robovie mR2: The Robot with an iPod Touch for a Heart
A smaller and "cuter" version of Robovie R2, which is primarily developed by Reo Matsumura, has been unveiled by ATR (Advanced Telecommunications Research Institute) Intelligent Robotics & Communications Lab. The Robovie mR2 is a robot which works by popping an iPod Touch into it, at which point...
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Robot Knows How To Sort and Recycle Plastic
The robot, created by Mitsubishi Electric Engineering Corp and Osaka University researchers, identifies different plastic materials among rubbish and sorts them into piles. The new robot aims to boost plastic recycling levels by identifying six different types of plastics that can be recycled an...
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Digital Future Heralded For Forensic Medicine
Used currently at the University of Bern’s Institute of Forensic Medicine, Virtobot is capable of performing “virtual autopsies”. This means no more messy slicing of the skin and cracking open of the skull. Virtopsy, which stands for virtual autopsy, makes post-mortem examinations...
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Robovie-IV: For Robot-Human Society
“Through the accumulation of experimental research in our office as well as at a Science Museum, we are beginning to understand the communication features that are necessary for a robot to easily participate in our society. So, in the near future, we will be able to create a robot that can sup...
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I-Fairy: a Robot Presenter, Museum Guide, or Receptionist
Kokoro Co. Ltd.’s I-FAIRY is like a robot presenter, museum guide, or receptionist that detects people when they are nearby and then automatically begins reciting its lines. The “i” in its name stands for intelligent information icon, and its design is meant to evoke a “lovely fairy”. ...
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Cody: A New Humanoid Mobile-Manipulating Robot
Georgia Tech's Healthcare Robotics Lab creates a new humanoid robot called Cody. It is composed of a Segway RMP 50 Omni mobile base, 1-DoF vertical linear actuator, and a pair of 7-DoF Meka Arms with series elastic actuators. It also has "equilibrium point controllers" (EPC) which vastly simplif...