We spent most of this week arguing thinking about whether armed autonomous robots are a good thing or a bad thing. I don’t think we should ban killer robots, but lots of people think that it’s very clear that we should. There’s been an enormous debate in the comments of these articles, and on Twitter as well. Georgia Tech’s Ron Arkin weighed in this week, and we’ll have another expert perspective next week. We’re not expecting to reach a consensus here: there’s no easy (or even unambiguously correct) answer. What we’re trying to do, though, is to provide as many perspectives on the issue as possible to help you inform your own thinking. The ethics of robotics is something that we’re very interested in, and we’ll be returning to it in a variety of contexts over this year and next.
Still, that’s all some heavy, heavy stuff, you know? So let’s all just chill out with a bunch of robot videos.
Someone at Telsa must have thought to themselves, “Let’s design a robot that can recharge our electric car as creepily as possible,” because this:
Just exactly what I want living in my garage. Not other details on this yet, unfortunately.
[ Tesla ]
While we’re on the topic(s) of robots, cars, and creepy:
Via [ Consumerist ]
Savioke’s little delivery robot, which is called Botlr or Alo or Savi-One or Relay, is now also called Dash, thanks to its new job delivering anything you want (within reason, please) at the Crowne Plaza San Jose-Silicon Valley:
[ Savioke ]
Can you believe that Curiosity has been exploring Mars for three years already?
Personally, I stillcan’t believe it managed to land safely in the first place.
[ Curiosity ]
I hate to break it to you, Harry Potter fans, but owls are really, really, really dumb, and they’re never going to deliver your mail. Robots totally will, though:
[ UMD Robotics ]
It’s cuuute and I WANT ONE:
[ Dash Robotics ]
There’s a new version of the Sphero robot called SPRK that’s been optimized to allow kids (and adults) to easily script programs for the robot to follow through an easy-to-use app:
[ Sphero SPRK ]
Experts explain how a new robotic composite fiber placement system will be used to build large space structures for space vehicles. Lightweight composites have the potential to increase the amount of payload that can be carried by a rocket along with lowering its total production cost. The robotic system is part of the Composites Technology Center at NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama.
[ NASA MSFC ]
Finally, people are teaching robots how to spend less time not wearing pants:
Research from the Georgia Institute of Technology has produced a systematic tool that allows animators to create realistic motion for virtual humans who are getting dressed. The new algorithm enables virtual characters to intelligently manipulate simulated cloth to achieve the task of dressing with different dressing styles for various types of garment and fabric.
The research team’s long-term goal is to develop assistive technologies that would enable robots of the future to help disabled or elderly adults with self care, such as getting dressed.
[ Georgia Tech ]
The reconfigurable inspection robot KAIRO 3 with its snake-like kinematics can autonomously climb up unknown obstacles like stairs. An integrated rotating laser scanner (KaRoLa) is used to capture precise 3D point clouds. Multiple point clouds are registered and a 2.5D map is generated. Based on this map paths over obstacles are planned and motions with joint angles are generated. The resulting paths depend on the current configuration (amount of modules) of the reconfigurable inspection robot KAIRO 3.
[ FZI ]
More gymnastics from YouTube user Hinamitetu’s clever robots!
[ YouTube ]
The robotic arm COMPI is a development of the Robotics Innovation Center of the German Research Center for Artificial Intelligence (DFKI). The system has six rotary joints that implement various control modes via one FPGA. COMPI mainly serves as a research platform in the field of dynamic control. Control strategies, as they are evaluated by means of the robot arm, playing with force and torque-based tasks - for example in the field of human-robot interaction - an important role. The results of the research are continuously incorporated into other robotic systems with similar kinematic structures.
[ COMPI ]
Based on 3D Robotics’ Solo drone, the Solo AGCO Edition UAV is a dedicated (and autonomous) crop monitoring drone that comes packaged with an IR camera for monitoring plant vigor:
[ AGCO Solo ] via [ DIY Drones ]
If you’re new to Pepper, here are the first couple of apps you’ll probably be running to get introduced to the capabilities of your robot:
[ Pepper ]
At NASA’s Armstrong Flight Research Center, Robert Jensen’s full-time job is flying futuristic subscale robotic aircraft, which sounds pretty sweet:
[ NASA Armstrong ]
ESCHER is still hard at work, post-DRC, with an elegant performance on a rough terrain task:
The robot also seems to be gaining confidence in its balance, demonstrating its ability to walk on a variety of different terrain and up stairs with unknown height variations. Watch through to the end of this video to see an impressive shove recovery, as well:
[ TREC ]
Thanks Robert!
Here’s something we didn’t really get to see at the DRC Finals: a simultaneous view of IHMC’s ATLAS robot, what the robot sees, and what the team is doing during a run:
I hope at some point, one of the teams will post a version like this, except in real time and with audio from the robot drivers.
[ IHMC Robotics ]
Lastly this week we’ve got an even more unique perspective on the DRC Finals, from the head camera of MIT’s ATLAS. It’s sped-up 6x, so you only have to wait until 4 minutes in to see the robot faceplant.
[ MIT DRC ]
Evan Ackerman is a senior editor at IEEE Spectrum. Since 2007, he has written over 6,000 articles on robotics and technology. He has a degree in Martian geology and is excellent at playing bagpipes.
