The 10 Coolest Drones at the World's Biggest Robot War Games
David Hambling for Popular Mechanics: Unmanned Warrior is the world's biggest robot war game, currently taking place for two weeks off the coast of Scotland. It was proposed by First Sea Lord Admiral George Zambellas to give airborne, surface, and underwater drones from various suppliers a chance to show off their prowess. Unmanned Warrior is part of Joint Warrior, an exercise involving 30 warships and submarines from 18 nations. But for the newly inaugurated robot portion, the U.S. is a strong presence, with teams from the Office of Naval Research (ONR).
As robots continue packing increased capability in smaller, lower-cost packages, these exercises are a glimpse into the future of naval warfare. Of course, none of these drones are armed for these exercises. These Unmanned Warriors are not trusted to carry weapons—at least not yet.
The first-ever Unmanned Warrior will wrap up on October 20. Cont'd...
A Drone Just Might Save Your Life Someday
In times of emergency, a drone is often the cheapest and most efficient way to find a missing person, deliver needed medicine, or survey a disaster scene.
The Robotics Industry Must Overcome the Awareness Gap
We must educate and evangelize to bust the myths and show what automated business processes can do. The technology is ready - now we have to show the world its value.
This Robot Can Do More Push-Ups Because It Sweats
Evan Ackerman for IEEE Spectrum: When we use our muscles, they produce heat as a byproduct. When we use them a lot, we need to actively cool them, which is why we sweat. By sweating, we pump water out of our bodies, and as that water evaporates, it cools us down. Robots, especially dynamic robots like humanoids that place near-constant high torque demands on their motors, generate enough heat that it regularly becomes a major constraint on their performance. One of the reasons that SCHAFT did so well at the DRC Trials, for example, was their fancy liquid-cooled motors that could put out lots of torque over an extended period of time without overheating.
Engineers solve this heat-generating problem in most mechanical systems by using fans, heat sinks, and radiators, which means that you’ve got all of this dedicated cooling infrastructure that takes up space and adds mass. At the IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS) this week, Japanese researchers presented a novel idea of how to cool humanoid robots in a much more efficient way: Design them to be able to sweat water straight out of their bones. Cont'd...
What Leading AI, Machine Learning And Robotics Scientists Say About The Future
Jason Lim for Forbes: Every year there is a new hot topic in tech. Today, it’s all about artificial intelligence, machine learning, virtual reality and autonomous vehicles. The difference between now and the past is that everything is becoming interconnected at a faster rate.
We are entering an extremely critical time in history where society will change dramatically – how we work, live and play. Science fiction is morphing into reality. Flying cars exist, cars that drive themselves are on the road, and artificial intelligence that automates our lives is here.
To make all of this amazing science and technology happen, it takes some extremely intelligent and curious people. In many ways, scientists are still at the helm of discovering breakthroughs through research. Cont'd...
Our Concept of an Open-Source Online Platform for Makers and Educators to Share Their Projects in the Robotics Makers Community
This is an outline plan to create and develop an open-source robotics community. If you have some ideas and want to share them, please let me know.
Omnidirectional Mobile Robot Has Just Two Moving Parts
Byron Spice for Carnegie Mellon University: More than a decade ago, Ralph Hollisinvented the ballbot, an elegantly simple robot whose tall, thin body glides atop a sphere slightly smaller than a bowling ball. The latest version, called SIMbot, has an equally elegant motor with just one moving part: the ball.
The only other active moving part of the robot is the body itself.
The spherical induction motor (SIM) invented by Hollis, a research professor in Carnegie Mellon University's Robotics Institute, and Masaaki Kumagai, a professor of engineering at Tohoku Gakuin University in Tagajo, Japan, eliminates the mechanical drive systems that each used on previous ballbots. Because of this extreme mechanical simplicity, SIMbot requires less routine maintenance and is less likely to suffer mechanical failures. Cont'd...
Shell Ocean Discovery XPRIZE Competition
The $7 Million Shell Ocean Discovery XPRIZE is a global competition challenging teams to advance deep-sea technologies for autonomous, fast and high-resolution ocean exploration.
Deep-Diving Robots Zap, Kill Invasive Lionfish
Mindy Weisberger for Live Science: The robotics company iRobot, known for creating the autonomous and endearing Roomba vacuums, is taking steps to make a clean sweep of lionfish in the coastal waters of the Atlantic Ocean, with a robot designed to target and dispatch the invasive fish.
A diving robot will enable individuals on the ocean surface to remotely zap and kill lionfish with electrical charges. The effort is meant to help curb the fast-growing populations of these voracious predators, which are recognized by environmental officials as a serious threat to marine ecosystems in the western Atlantic.
The initiative to launch the lionfish-targeting robot is called Robots in Service of the Environment (RISE) and represents an iRobot partnership with organizations and volunteer experts in the fields of robotics, engineering and conservation. Cont'd...
Autonomous mobile robots can accomplish a variety of tasks.
Bob Violino for ZDNet: Autonomous robots can perform actions or complete tasks with a high degree of autonomy, which makes them ideal for applications such as space exploration or cleaning your living room carpet. Mobile robots are capable of moving from place to place.
Put these capabilities together and you got a powerful machine that can handle lots of tasks in industrial environments such as factories, as well as in hospitals, hotels, and other areas. And, in fact, one of the more prominent trends in robotics today is the growing popularity of autonomous mobile robots (AMRs), with new vendors jumping into the market and sales on the rise.
AMRs are modular, self-driving mobile robots that can be used for a variety of business applications, such as locomotion, mapping, navigation, and inspection. Cont'd...
Robodex Ghost Robotics™ Launches Ghost Minitaur™ Direct-Drive Legged Robot Platform
Ghost Minitaur™ is a patent-pending medium-sized legged robot highly adept at perceiving tactile sensations. Its high torque motors, motor controllers, and specialized leg design allow this machine to run and jump over difficult terrain while actively balancing, climb fences, and rapidly reorient from falls. High-speed and high-resolution encoders let the robot see and feel the ground through the motors and adapt faster than the blink of an eye.
Full Press Release:
Ford, U-M Accelerate Autonomous Vehicle Research with Ford Researchers In-House at New Robotics Lab on U-M Campus
Ford and the University of Michigan today announce they are teaming up to accelerate autonomous vehicle research and development with a first-ever arrangement that embeds Ford researchers and engineers into a new state-of-the-art robotics laboratory on U-M's Ann Arbor campus.
While the new robotics laboratory opens in 2020, by the end of this year Ford will move a dozen researchers into the North Campus Research Complex (NCRC).
The announcement is the latest in a series of actions by Ford as it moves toward having fully autonomous SAE-defined level 4-capable vehicles available for high-volume commercial use in 2021. Autonomous vehicles are part of Ford's expansion to be an auto and a mobility company. Full Press Release:
Big Picture Processes Impact Efficient Lineside Delivery
The self-driving vehicle (SDV) using an autonomous guidance system breaks free of magnetic strips and pre-programmed routes.
Canada Is Using Lasers and Robots to Study a Mysterious Curling 'Frankenbroom'
From Martin Smith at Vice: Inside a slightly shabby building on the outskirts of of Kemptville, near Ottawa, the World Curling Federation (WCF) has gathered a world-class team of scientists and premier curling talent to unravel a scientific mystery that is rattling the foundations of curling.
At stake is nothing less than the future of one of the world’s oldest team sports.
The aim of the tests at the so-called World Sweeping Summit, which runs from Wednesday to Friday, is to understand how controversial new brush heads—some have dubbed them ‘Frankenbrooms’—and new sweeping techniques are able to manipulate the trajectory of curling stones in radically unprecedented ways... (full story) (supplemental video related to the "great" curling stone controversy of 1870)
Robophysics: Robots in Motion
Researchers are investigating the core fundamentals of locomotion as it exists in nature and as it applies to the movement of robotic systems. Great strides have been made in giving motion to robots, but we have a long way to go to have robots duplicate biological life.
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