RobotEscape

We’ve admired Festo’s bio-inspired robots in the pastThey’ve just come out with two new species: aquatic penguins, and flying penguins. In case you were wondering, Festo is a German company that creates and sells pneumatic and electric actuators for the automation industry.

Fancy making your own robot crab? Then check out the KicCrab Walker Robot Crab Kit.

The Kit comes with everything you need to make your own robot crab, including 3 servos, the KicChip processor, LEDs and all the bopdy parts, it comes with a built in battery which can be charged via USB, check out the video of it in action below.The KicCrab Walker Robot Crab Kit is available for $79.95 from.

Video after the jump

[geeky-gadgets]

The HAL Robotic Exoskeleton is officially going into production. Priced at $4200, this exoskeleton could change the lives of people with degenerative muscle diseases, or accident victims to regain basic mobility. Its battery can hold up to five hours of operation time. Video after the jump.






[techfresh]

March 26, 2009 When consuming your five a day of fruit and vegetables, have you ever stopped to consider the back breaking labor and significant resources involved in their production? According to Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratories (CSAIL), the robotic, computerized answer to minimizing these factors could be just around the corner. Students at the laboratory have undertaken a project that utilizes robots to take the thinking and manual labor out of producing specialty crops such as fruit and vegetables.

Conceived by Nikolaus Correll, the project is being designed to use computerized link-up and sensors to potted plants, so that the plants themselves divulge when nutrients and water are needed, or when fruit is produced. The autonomous gardener robot is equipped with a dexterous arm complete with camera, a "hand" (two opposing pads) and a watering pump to tend the plants, while soil sensing and networking components are attached to the plants themselves. The bot will be also able to distinguish and pick ripe produce, water or pollinate the plants.

If the base of the robot shown in the video below looks familiar - it is - having begun life as an iRobot Roomba vacuum cleaner. Additional technologies utilized for the project include the Lightweight Communications Marshaller (LCM) which came from a DARPA Grand Challenge Vehicle and object recognition based on the LabelMe image annotation tool.

The aim in the long term is to develop a fully functional automated green house using the robotic system referred to by Rus as precision agriculture. If costs could be minimized and the system utilized in main stream primary production this approach could impact the way certain crops are cultivated and harvested by reducing the resources used in the growth stage, as nutrients and water would only be dispensed when needed.

According to CSAIL, this would greatly benefit both the environment due to the heavy burden placed on resources by the production of such specialized crops, and the pocket of the grower. The manually intensive labor would also be an issue of the past. Perhaps the days of the fruit and veg picker are numbered?

MechaDroid Type C3 robot receptionist is a clever robot that adopts face recognition technology to recognize the face of the visitors. The robot was recently unveiled at Tokyo’s CEATEC conference. It also features an embedded touchscreen panel that displays important info and required directions. You can purchase the MechaDroid Type C3 robot receptionist with your $28,000 upwards, depending on the customer’s needs.

[techfresh]

The Honda Research Institute Japan, along with ATR and Shimadzu Corporation (all of whom can expect threatening letters from yours truly) has developed a system that makes it possible to control robots with your thoughts alone. Wow, this doesn't sound scary at all.

The technology uses electroencephalography (EEG) and near-infrared spectroscopy (NIRS) to allow a human to control a robot, in this case the Honda ASIMO, using mere thought. The technology offers up to 90 percent control accuracy without the use of physical implants, a huge milestone in human-to-robot interface that the research group hopes will yield new advances in robotics and artificial intelligence.

What could possibly go wrong? Besides everything. And by everything I mean the destruction of the entire human race. And also, this LEGO castle I'm building. But I put so much time into it!

Adam, a robot scientist, has officially "discovered new scientific knowledge independently of a human operator."

The device has already identified the role of several genes in yeast cells, and has the ability to plan further experiments to test its own hypotheses. Ross King, from the university's computer science department, remarked that the robot is meant to take care of the tedious aspects of the scientific method, freeing up human scientists for "more advanced experiments."

Yeah, too bad this robotic bastard is gonna trump all the human scientists. How long until a robot receives a Nobel prize -- two, three years? Then what -- what's the next big discovery?

[geekologie]

Developed by Japan's National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology (JAJINAS), HRP-4C is a robot designed to walk, talk, and work a catwalk like the sexy little vixen harbinger of death hat she is.

Standing at just over 5-feet tall and 95-pounds....the she-bot features 30 motors spread throughout its body with an additional eight motors in its face for expressing general boredom and disgust with the help. Its main purpose is entertainment and to attract crowds much like its fleshy counterparts -- so don't expect home cooked meals and laundry service should you take the $200,000 robot home.

As is evident from the photo, that guy is a demented pervert. IT'S A ROBOT, BRO -- HER ASS IS METAL. Some people, I swear. So anyway, like I was saying: I hid in a bathroom stall at the Museum of Natural History this weekend until it closed and then had my way in the Hall of Dinosaurs. Best weekend EVER.

Hit the jump for another picture and a video proving why this is the worst model ever.

Autonomous flying quadcopter robots built from off-the-shelf parts in €300 kits (US$380), could establish radio networks for phones and wireless Internet in disaster zones. The system is being developed by German researchers at the Ilmenau University of Technology, which is seeking phD students to assist with the project.

When infrastructure is damaged or destroyed, it’s vital that people are able to access information or call for help, and that teams on the ground can communicate efficiently. The quadcopter bots could provide ad-hoc, temporary networks for communication more quickly than technicians on the ground.

The bots are equipped with satellite navigation, GPS, and VIA Pico-ITX hardware. They are designed to fly to various points on high ground, for example the top of a building, and provide network coverage.

But while the bots themselves cost €300, the batteries to power them cost €1,000 (US$1,265), and provide just 20 minutes of flying time. After the bot has landed, it can remain operational for “several hours.”

[gizmag]

Still remember the Robotic Carp that we mentioned before? Here is a new robot fish that looks like a real fish. Dubbed as the Fishbot, this robot is developed by Yamamoto Laboratory. It was built to exacting specifications based on the movement of real fish and will be used for research purposes. What makes this robot special is that its eyes that can follow you wherever you go. .



[techfresh]

Here’s a very smart robot to control your money, presenting the Robot Money Box. This little robot can talk, count, and even tell the time. Insert your money into the bank and it will keep track of it for you, also telling you how close you are to any set target amount, as well as giving encouragement for you to continue saving. It may also scold you if you seem to be taking out to much for his liking

[techfresh]

Meet Saya, a robot “teacher” in Japan. She can express the six emotions most commonly displayed by human teachers: surprise, fear, disgust, anger, happiness, and sadness. She can call out the students’ names, offer a polite “Thank you”, and admonish the pupils to be quiet.

Saya’s developer, Hiroshi Kobayashi, a Tokyo University of Science professor, reports “Children even start crying when they are scolded.” I’d probably cry if a creepy robot teacher scolded me, too.

MSNBC calls Saya’s face “eerily lifelike”. I call it just plain eerie.

Ah, the teaser, this time in the form of the elusive Dell Adamo. It's all here: an ephemeral feel, robots, lasers, a fashion model, and a catchy slow-jam tugging at the bootstraps of urban cool. Sure, it doesn't tell us a damn thing more about Dell's ultra-slim, luxury laptop. But if you're in for an exquisite tease done with perfection, this is it.

[engadget]

As you're no doubt aware, it's the cute ones that can cause the most trouble. For instance, consider Toshiba's newest: ApriAttenda, pictured here at a press event at the company's lab in Kasawaki, Kanagawa prefecture, suburban Tokyo, is one meter tall, has three fingers and small CCD cameras in the palm of each hand, and can rise an additional 0.3 meters if the need should present itself. Sure, the device's ability to open refrigerator doors and lift boxes is impressive, but can we realistically believe that things will end there? Or does the permanently astonished look on its slightly Wall-E-esque visage disguise more sinister motives? You've been warned.

[daylife]

I just don't get it -- why take the chance? What's wrong with paying some pimply adolescent $6/hour to serve ice cream? You have to look at his ugly face, that's what. Still, I want the record to show that I am anti-robotic ice cream server.

These Kuka industrial robots were programmed by 26 students over 5 weeks to serve ice cream (with toppings!) to attendees at Ohio Northern University's homecoming festivities.

Well, like the saying goes, "I scream, you scream, we all scream for HOLY SHIT THAT ROBOT HAS SPRINKLES -- HIT THE DECK!!!"

Hit the jump for a relatively boring 5-minute video about the servers of death.

This is a little gallery of scary-ass robots that want to kill you so they can mate with your computer. This particular model is called "My Spoon" and was designed to help people with no arms or really sucky arms to eat. As you can see, it's about to choke out Japanese Health Minister Yoichi Masuzoe. God knows what's it's gonna do to him once he's out, but I suspect use his body as a breeding chamber for an army of nanobots. These nanobots will then invade our fresh water supply and, quite possibly, clog your faucet.

The iCub is an iStupidly named robot-child created by the RobotCub Consortium in Italy (not to be confused with Opus Dei). He was designed to have the movement and learning capabilities of a three-year old child and a face only a mother could love. A really loving mother. A blind one with no ears or sense of feeling in her hands.

The iCub is able to crawl and walk, make human-like eye and head movements and recognise and grasp objects like a toddler, scientists say.

'It's hoped the iCub will develop its cognitive capabilities in the same way as a child, progressively learning about its own bodily skills, how to interact with the world and eventually how to communicate with other individuals.'

Oh man, it seems like only yesterday I first learning about my own "bodily skills". Awh yeah -- you know the one I'm talking about: I can pull my thumb back all the way!

Meet iCub - the robot that moves and learns like a child [dailymail]
and
Youtube

[geekologie]

Remember BaR2-D2, the robot that dispenses beer instead of light sabers which Jabba should have had in his barge? Here is a video of the thing serving drinks in a real party.

The BaR2D2 is a radio-controlled bar-bot, with a "motorized beer elevator, motorized ice/mixer drawer, and six-bottle shot dispenser." It's also "sound activated neon lighted", because alcohol delivery is not complete without psychotropic light effects. According to its creator:

The concept for BaR2D2 was born when a friend showed up to an event with a radio-controlled cooler. We joked about taking the idea to the next level and in the Spring of 2008, construction began.