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Researchers help robots think and plan in the abstract

By Guest PostAugust 5, 2018Sciencegeorge konidaris, multi step tasks, perceptual abstractions, procedural abstractions, robot, roboticist

New research shows how robots can autonomously construct abstract representations of their surroundings and use them to plan.

PROVIDENCE, R.I. [Brown University] — Researchers from Brown University and MIT have developed a method for helping robots plan for multi-step tasks by constructing abstract representations of the world around them. Their study, published in the Journal of Artificial Intelligence Research, is a step toward building robots that can think and act more like people. (more…)

Robot Monitors Chicken Houses and Retrieves Eggs

By Guest PostMay 4, 2018Technologychicken houses, colin usher, gtri, monitor, robot

A new mobile autonomous robot could perform daily monitoring tasks while safely interacting with chickens in commercial chicken houses, according to researchers at the Georgia Tech Research Institute (GTRI). This advance could help farmers reduce the likelihood of disease outbreaks, lessen their labor costs, and allow them the freedom to take on more important tasks. (more…)

Fruit flies – fermented-fruit connoisseurs – are relentless party crashers

By Guest PostFebruary 17, 2014Sciencealgorithm, controlling robotic systems, dickinson lab, fermented fruit connoisseurs, floris van breugel, fruit flies, genus drosophila, glass of cabernet, mental map, michael dickinson, neurons, robot, university of washington, visual exploration

That fruit fly joining you just moments after you poured that first glass of cabernet, has just used its poppy-seed-sized brain to conduct a finely-choreographed search, one that’s been described for the first time by researchers at the University of Washington.

The search mission is another example of fruit flies executing complex behaviors with very little “computational” power, their brains having 100,000 neurons compared to house flies with 300,000 neurons and humans with 100 billion. (more…)

Innovative soft robotics technology spawns new products

By Guest PostJanuary 12, 2014Technologybill culley, cornell university, empire robotics, heinrich jaeger, hod lipson, industrial model, innovative, jamming gripper prototypes, jamming transition, john amend, military robots, new products, robot, robotic grippers, sidney nagel, soft robotics technology, university of chicago, versaball

The robot gripper invented by researchers at the University of Chicago and Cornell University is now available commercially. Empire Robotics, the company founded to commercialize the invention, is taking orders for the limited first release of its product called VERSABALL, scheduled to ship later this month.

“When we first started with the universal jamming gripper we did not think about industrial applications,” said Heinrich Jaeger, the William J. Friedman and Alica Townsend Professor in Physics at the University of Chicago. “But soon there were inquiries from various companies and in those early days we had to tell them that we are in basic research rather than R&D and that therefore we could not really make robotic grippers for sale.” (more…)

CU-Boulder Team Develops Swarm of Pingpong Ball-Sized Robots

By Guest PostDecember 19, 2012Science, Technology20 robots, behaviors, career, collaborating cells, colorado boulder, droplets, dustin reishus, fictional nanomorphs, intelligent robotic devices, joseph tanner, liquid that thinks, nick farrow, nikolaus correll, pattern recognition, pingpong ball, robot, robotic building block, robotics, sensor based motion, terminator films, university

University of Colorado Boulder Assistant Professor Nikolaus Correll likes to think in multiples. If one robot can accomplish a singular task, think how much more could be accomplished if you had hundreds of them.

Correll and his computer science research team, including research associate Dustin Reishus and professional research assistant Nick Farrow, have developed a basic robotic building block, which he hopes to reproduce in large quantities to develop increasingly complex systems.

Recently the team created a swarm of 20 robots, each the size of a pingpong ball, which they call “droplets.” When the droplets swarm together, Correll said, they form a “liquid that thinks.” (more…)

Driver’s ed for Robots

By Guest PostOctober 31, 2012Scienceadvance, advanced institute, area, bio contaminated, christopher rasmussen, columbia university, cyber, delaware, disaster relief, drexel university, drive, earthquake, energy plant, georgia, herbert tanner, hybrid, indiana university, institute, ioannis poulakakis, japanese, korean, navigate environment, nuclear, ohio, phase 1, physical, polytechnic institute, purdue university, radioactive, robot, robotics technology, sensor network, state university, swarthmore college, system modeling, teach, Technology, tsunami, university, vehicle, worcester

UD joins research team teaching robots to respond in disaster emergencies

How do you teach a robot to get into vehicle and drive it? Three University of Delaware professors plan to figure it out by the end of next year.

Christopher Rasmussen, Ioannis Poulakakis and Herbert Tanner are part of a team competing in a new U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) Challenge. The team, with members from 10 schools, led by Drexel University, is one of several groups worldwide working to advance robotics technology for disaster relief. (more…)

Training Your Robot the PaR-PaR Way

By Guest PostOctober 31, 2012Scienceautomation, berkeley lab, biological design, challenge, changhao bi, cloning, compiler, database, dna molecules, dynamic, experimental data, experimental error, gregory linshiz, j5, jay keasling, language, nathan hillson, new trick, nina stawski, non repetitive, par par, program, programming, programming tool, rate, research environment, robot, robot platform, robot programming, robotic protocol, sean poust, software program, syntax, virtual object

Berkeley Lab and JBEI Researchers Develop a Biology-Friendly Robot Programming Language

Teaching a robot a new trick is a challenge. You can’t reward it with treats and it doesn’t respond to approval or disappointment in your voice. For researchers in the biological sciences, however, the future training of robots has been made much easier thanks to a new program called “PaR-PaR.”

Nathan Hillson, a biochemist at the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE)’s Joint BioEnergy Institute (JBEI), led the development of PaR-PaR, which stands for Programming a Robot. PaR-PaR is a simple high-level, biology-friendly, robot-programming language that allows researchers to make better use of liquid-handling robots and thereby make possible experiments that otherwise might not have been considered. (more…)

Fewer Deaths, Complications with Robotic Bladder Cancer Surgery, But Cost is Higher

By Guest PostApril 8, 2012Healthadam s kibel, bladder, bladder cancer, cancer, european urology, georgetown university hospital, hua yin yu, intravenous nutrition, jim hu, parenteral nutrition, paul l nguyen, radical cystectomy, robot, robotic assisted surgery, robotic surgery, statistical analysis

With technological advancements opening the door to less invasive medical procedures, robotic-assisted surgery is becoming increasingly popular, despite being more expensive than traditional surgery. Robotic-assisted surgical removal of the bladder due to cancer is a new approach to the traditional “open” — or more invasive — operation called a radical cystectomy.

Bladder cancer is the fourth most commonly diagnosed cancer in men, and the American Cancer Society estimates that 73,500 people will be diagnosed with bladder cancer in 2012. A third of those will require a radical cystectomy. (more…)

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