Robot Swarms - University of Sheffield

Guardium UGV G-Nius unmanned ground vehicle in action Israeli Army Israel

SPHERES Smartphone Workbench

The Smart SPHERES space robot (Synchronized Position Hold, Engage, Reorient, Experimental Satellites) equipped with an Android smartphone performs a video survey inside of the International Space Station's Kibo laboratory in December 2012.

AUJIK (Stefan Larsson): YUKI

AUJIK (Stefan Larsson): YUKI from Filmform on Vimeo.

In YUKI a robotic tree and two children are interacting in a snowy landscape and it is hard to tell which one controls who and whether it is a game or a drill. It is inspired by Ocean D. Howells pamphlet "in the playground of Technological Singularity". The intention was to get the image of a super 8 film from the 70-ies, a kind of nostalgic vision of the future. Music by christ. - one sunny cloudy day.

Natalis Teaser

Natalis Teaser from Shißy Shoßu on Vimeo.

Natalis tells the story of the robot Ea

ME310 2013 PaperBot Challenge

ME310 2013 PaperBot Challenge from Tuomas Sahramaa on Vimeo.

Well.ca Virtual QR Code Store Toronto

Canada largest online health and beauty store Well.ca installs a QR Code virtual store in Union Station, Toronto for the month of April 2012

Blind Juggling Robots Bring Calm to Chaos

Publicado el 06/02/2013 The brains controlling the next generation of interactive, walking robots may well come from a laboratory in Zurich, where scientists are testing new algorithms on juggling machines. With no sensory help in the form of cameras or microphones, the robots are able to keep balls in the air with nothing but mathematics to guide them. To the casual observer, the Swinging Blind Juggler could be an elaborate piece of modern sculpture, or part of an intricate game. But it is neither. The juggler is part of an experiment to test mathematical algorithms that could one day allow the next generation of robots to walk. Algorithms are mathematical steps used in modern computing and other fields, to provide instructions for performance of certain tasks, or to bring control to otherwise uncontrollable actions - in this case the bouncing of a ball. Philipp Reist at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology, devised the first juggling robot. Its platform is slightly concave to keep the ball centred. Reist wanted to know if algorithms alone, programmed into a computer, could keep a ball bouncing at a controlled height and position indefinitely. SOUNDBITE) (English) PHILIPP REIST, PH.D. STUDENT AND BLIND JUGGLER DEVELOPER, SAYING: "The juggling robot to do this juggling pattern sets a very difficult task that seems almost impossible at first sight. And there our goal is to come up with an algorithm that uses chaos to efficiently achieve these juggling patterns" For the algorithm to work, it must compensate for deviations that would otherwise disturb the ball's flight through the air...slight imperfections in the ball's design example, or disturbances in the air around it. The Swinging Blind Juggler manages to keep its ball in the air without any sensory input from cameras or microphones. Mathematics alone does the job. For inventor, Flavio Fontana, the challenge was to synchronise the swinging motion of the pendulum to the flying ball. SOUNDBITE) (English) FLAVIO FONTANA, MASTERS STUDENT AND INVENTOR OF SWINGING BLIND JUGGLER, SAYING: "I think we can apply that in every dynamical system, everything that moves, it's always the same problem. You have something, you have to describe it mathematically, then you need to come up some how with a way of influencing it, these are the algorithms, and then you can control it and it behaves in a way you want it to behave" And both scientists are eager to spread the word. They take their robots to museums and exhibitions as often as possible to demonstrate the power of mathematics to bring control to chaos.

Hierarchical Reinforcement Learning for Robot Navigation

Publicado el 06/02/2013 Complex trajectories for robot navigation can be decomposed in elementary movement primitives. Reinforcement Learning is employed to learn the movement primitives, as well as the combination of primitives, to reach a desired goal position while avoiding obstacles.

New hair transplant robot launched in UK

Publicado el 06/02/2013 A British man has become the first in Europe to have a hair transplant using a robot in London.