Robots that safely navigate busy corridors to deliver medicines to nurses. And drones that manoeuvre around people, rubbish bins and poles without smashing things up. This is possible thanks to the models developed by researcher Javier Alonso-Mora from TU Delft.
Intel RealSense
Intel RealSense is known in the robotics community for its plug-and-play stereo cameras. These cameras make gathering 3D depth data a seamless process, with easy integrations into ROS to simplify the software development for your robots. From the RealSense team, Joel Hagberg talks about how they built this product, which allows roboticists to perform computer vision and machine learning at the edge.
Researchers from the University of Bristol have demonstrated how a new special type of camera can build a pictorial map of where it has been and use this map to know where it currently is, something that will be incredibly useful in the development of smart sensors, driverless cars and robotics.
The recent outbreak of the severe acute respiratory syndrome, caused by COVID-19 has spread globally in an unprecedented way. Robotics is a promising part of the solution to help control and mitigate its effects. This work presents the design and implementation of several perception questionnaires to assess healthcare providers’ level of acceptance and awareness of robotics for COVID-19 control in clinical scenarios.
MIT researchers have created the first fiber with digital capabilities, able to sense, store, analyze, and infer activity after being sewn into a shirt. In a first, the digital fiber contains memory, temperature sensors, and a trained neural network program for inferring physical activity.
The Robot Teleoperativo combines the rugged locomotion of HyQReal robot with dexterous and powerful manipulation assured by a new robotic arm, controlled by immersive VR visualization and haptic teleoperation. In a new video, researchers show the achieved results: the Robot Teleoperativo is able to open doors, access fire equipment, gather precious items, navigate in the dark, and walk over difficult terrain.
I took part in the first panel at the BSI conference The Digital World: Artificial Intelligence. The subject of the panel was AI Governance and Ethics. Emma (my co-panelist) and I each gave short opening presentations prior to the Q&A. The title of my talk was Why is Ethical Governance in AI so hard? Something I’ve thought about alot in recent months.
Matt Bilsky, founder and CEO of FLX Solutions, discusses the snake-like robot he invented called the FLX BOT. The FLX BOT consists of modular links, each with a joint that can extend and rotate to get into tight spaces. Each link includes sensors including inertial measurement units and a camera. The robot is used to navigate and work in challenging environments, such as above ceilings and within walls. Matt discusses the key innovations of his product as well as his academic and entrepreneurial journey that led him to the FLX BOT.
To celebrate Women’s Day 2021 and the 50th anniversary of women’s right to vote in Switzerland, the Swiss NCCRs (National Centres of Competence in Research) wanted to show you who our women researchers are and what a day in their job looks like. The videos are targeted at women and girls of school and undergraduate age to show what day to day life as a scientist is like and make it more accessible. Each NCCR hosted a week where they published several videos covering multiple scientific disciplines, and here we are bringing you what was produced by NCCR Digital Fabrication.
As robot swarms leave the lab and enter our daily lives, it is important that we find ways by which we can effectively communicate with robot swarms, especially ones that contain a high number of robots. In our lab, we are thinking of ways to make swarms for people that are easy and intuitive to interact with. By making robots expressive, we will be able to understand their state and therefore, we will be able to make decisions accordingly. To that extent, we have created a system where humans can build a canvas with robots and create shapes with up to 300 real robots and up to 1000 simulated robots.
Robotics is both an exciting and intimidating field because it takes so many different capabilities and disciplines to spin up a robot. This goes all the way from mechatronic design and hardware engineering to some of the more philosophical parts of software engineering. In this post, I will go through what it takes to put together a robot that is highly capable by today’s standards.
The World Bank estimates that 3.5 million tons of solid waste is produced by humans everyday, with America accounting for more than 250 million tons a year or over 4 pounds of trash per citizen. To the fictional Dr. Emmett Brown, this garbage is akin to “black gold” – ecologically powering cities, cars, and machines. In reality, the movie, “Back to The Future II” was inspired by the biomass gasification movement of 20th century in powering cars with wood during World War II when petroleum was scarce. Professor Loannis Leropoulos of the University of Bristol’s Robotics Laboratory is working on the next generation of bio-engineered fuel cells. Last week, Dr. Leropoulos demonstrated his revolutionary Microbial Fuel Cells (MFCs) for me. As witnessed, he is not just inspired by nature, but harnessing its beauty to power the next generation of robots.
