|  Author | Topic: Metal Men (Read 16,649 times) |
Big Bunny
Admin
member is offline
![[avatar]](http://img186.imageshack.us/img186/7415/eye4xn4.jpg "[avatar]")
Joined: Apr 2003
Gender: Male 
Posts: 50,822
Location: Sydney, Australia
|  | Metal Men
« Thread Started on Jun 7, 2007, 11:23am » | |
Japanese robot likes sushi, fears president
Tue Jun 5, 2007 3:31AM EDT
TOKYO (Reuters Life!) - Kansei frowns when he hears the word "bomb", smiles at "sushi" and looks scared and disgusted when someone says "president" -- and he isn't even human.
Japan's latest robot, called Kansei and created by a university research team, can pull up to 36 different facial expressions based on a program which creates word associations from a self-updating online database of 500,000 keywords.
Can you tell the difference:
![[image]](http://img468.imageshack.us/img468/5930/kanseismilebn1.jpg "[image]")
Kansei Smile
![[image]](http://img468.imageshack.us/img468/3545/kanseifrownpc5.jpg "[image]")
Kansei Frown
The English keywords then trigger the most appropriate facial expression, which ranges from happiness to sadness, anger and fear.
"What we are trying to do here is to create a flow of consciousness in robots so that they can make the relevant facial expressions," said project leader Junichi Takeno, a professor at Meiji University's School of Science and Technology.
"I believe that's going to be a key to improving communication between humans and robots," he said.
The robot has 19 movable parts underneath the silicone face mask. When he hears the word "president", the online database picks up associated words such as "Bush," "war" and "Iraq" and creates an expression which mixes fear and disgust.
Takeno says that in a few years, Kansei will also have speech abilities and will be able to convey feelings, which could be useful in places such as nursing homes for the elderly.
Japan is hooked on androids, with several companies selling robots that mimic human action such as playing drums or dancing to music.
With Japan's population expected to slide by around a quarter by 2050, and immigration a sensitive issue, some laboratories have developed humanoid robots that can work as maids.
Earlier this year, a university researcher created a robot that looks and moves exactly like him.
http://www.reuters.com/article/lifestyleMolt/idUSSP28439620070605
|
"All truth passes through three stages. First, it is ridiculed, second it is violently opposed, and third, it is accepted as self-evident."
Arthur Schopenhauer, Philosopher, 1788-1860
"In the final analysis, our most basic common link is that we all inhabit this small planet, breathe the same air, and we all cherish our children’s future."
John F. Kennedy |
|
Big Bunny
Admin
member is offline
Joined: Apr 2003
Gender: Male
Posts: 50,822
Location: Sydney, Australia
| | Re: Metal Men
« Reply #1 on Jun 7, 2007, 11:24am » | |
A robot is built to rescue soldiers
WASHINGTON, June 7 (UPI) -- U.S. researchers are developing a remote-controlled robot designed to rescue injured or abducted soldiers without putting their comrades at risk.
The prototype of the nearly 6-foot-tall Battlefield Extraction-Assist Robot, called Bear, can lift nearly 300 pounds with one arm, and its developer, Vecna Technologies of College Park, Md., is focusing on improving its two-legged lower body.
Tracks on its thighs and shins allow the robot to climb over rough terrain or up and down stairs while crouching or kneeling. Wheels at its hips, knees and feet allow it to switch to two wheels to travel over smooth surfaces while adopting a variety of positions.
The robot's humanoid body and teddy bear-style head give it a friendly appearance.
"A really important thing when you're dealing with casualties is trying to maintain that human touch," said Gary Gilbert of the U.S. Army's Telemedicine and Advanced Technology Research Center, which provided the initial $1 million development funding. Congress has since added $1.1 million.
The robot can also load trucks and carry equipment.
Bear is expected to be ready for field testing within five years.
http://www.sciencedaily.com/upi/index.ph....obotrescuer.xml
|
"All truth passes through three stages. First, it is ridiculed, second it is violently opposed, and third, it is accepted as self-evident."
Arthur Schopenhauer, Philosopher, 1788-1860
"In the final analysis, our most basic common link is that we all inhabit this small planet, breathe the same air, and we all cherish our children’s future."
John F. Kennedy |
|
Big Bunny
Admin
member is offline
Joined: Apr 2003
Gender: Male
Posts: 50,822
Location: Sydney, Australia
| | Re: Metal Men
« Reply #2 on Jun 8, 2007, 9:44am » | |
Bear robot rescues wounded troops
The US military is developing a robot with a teddy bear-style head to help carry injured soldiers away from the battlefield.
The Battlefield Extraction Assist Robot (BEAR) can scoop up even the heaviest of casualties and transport them over long distances over rough terrain.
New Scientist magazine reports that the "friendly appearance" of the robot is designed to put the wounded at ease.
It is expected to be ready for testing within five years.
While it is important to get medical attention for injured soldiers as soon as possible, it is often difficult and dangerous for their comrades to reach them and carry them back.
The 6ft tall Bear can cross bumpy ground without toppling thanks to a combination of gyroscopes and computer controlled motors to maintain balance.
![[image]](http://img505.imageshack.us/img505/9159/43020651robotimage203x2sa7.jpg "[image]")
BEAR FACTS
1. Teddy bear face designed to be reassuring
2. Hydraulic upper body carries up to 227kgs (500lbs)
3. When kneeling tracked "legs" travel over rubble. Switches to wheels on smooth surfaces
4. Dynamic Balance Behaviour (DBB) technology allows the robot to stand and carry loads upright on its ankles, knees or hips for nearly an hour
It is also narrow enough to squeeze through doorways, but can lift 135kg with its hydraulic arms in a single smooth movement, to avoid causing pain to wounded soldiers.
While the existing prototype slides its arms under its burden like a forklift, future versions will be fitted with manoeuvrable hands to gently scoop up casualties.
The Bear is controlled remotely and has cameras and microphones through which an operator sees and hears.
It can even tackle stairs while carrying a human-sized dummy.
Daniel Theobald, the president of Vecna Technologies, which is developing the robot for the US Army, said: "We saw a need for a robot that can essentially go where a human can. The robot will be an integral part of a military team."
Gary Gilbert, from the US Army's Telemedicine and Advanced Technology Research Centre in Frederick, Maryland, said that the teddy bear appearance was deliberate.
"A really important thing when you're dealing with casualties is trying to maintain that human touch."
Vecna is working on other potential applications for the robot technology - including helping move heavy patients in hospital.
Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/health/6729745.stm
Published: 2007/06/07 11:45:57 GMT
|
"All truth passes through three stages. First, it is ridiculed, second it is violently opposed, and third, it is accepted as self-evident."
Arthur Schopenhauer, Philosopher, 1788-1860
"In the final analysis, our most basic common link is that we all inhabit this small planet, breathe the same air, and we all cherish our children’s future."
John F. Kennedy |
|
Big Bunny
Admin
member is offline
Joined: Apr 2003
Gender: Male
Posts: 50,822
Location: Sydney, Australia
| | Re: Metal Men
« Reply #3 on Jun 11, 2007, 10:46am » | |
Source: National Institute of Standards and Technology
Date: June 11, 2007
Rescue Robot Tests To Offer Responders High-tech Help
Science Daily — National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) engineers are organizing the fourth in a series of Response Robot Evaluation Exercises for urban search and rescue (US&R) responders to be held on June 18-22, 2007, at Texas A&M's "Disaster City" training facility in College Station, Texas.
![[image]](http://www.sciencedaily.com/images/2007/06/070609112916.jpg "[image]")
An urban search and rescue robot moves across a rubble pile in a recent NIST/DHS exercise. The next rescue robot exercise will be held on June 18-22, 2007, at Texas A&M's "Disaster City" training facility. (Credit: NIST)
These events, sponsored by the Department of Homeland Security's (DHS) Science and Technology Directorate, test robot performance on emerging standard test methods using actual training scenarios for emergency responders. The results will be used to refine the test methods, and in developing usage guides that match specific kinds of US&R robots to particular disaster scenarios.
This exercise will use two Disaster City training scenarios. A simulated structural collapse of a municipal building will allow responders to deploy robots to search for victims and assist in "rendering the structure safe" for responders to extricate those victims. This will require robots to face a variety of challenges as they traverse complex and confined spaces within the structure's semi-collapsed walls, sloping floors, rubble and voids while searching for victims. The robots will be deploying high-tech sensors such as laser scanners to capture the size and shape of interior voids to help structural engineers set up shoring supports.
Responders also will use robots to investigate a "train wreck/derailment" involving a passenger train and an industrial HAZMAT tanker train carrying unknown substances. The unknown hazards of the incident will require emergency responders to direct work from a distance of 150 m (500 ft) initially. This scenario will require robots to traverse railroad tracks, wreckage and debris to map the scene, look in windows to locate victims, find hazardous leaks and identify tanker placards describing their contents.
Some robots also may take samples of unknown substances for analysis, all while being remotely controlled from a safe distance. This exercise will focus on ground robots that are highly agile, human-portable, or even throwable, and robots that can circumnavigate a large area from a remote operator station. The robots will feature a variety of sensors, including color cameras, two-way audio transmitters, thermal imagers, chemical sensors, 3D mapping systems and GPS locators paired with geographic information systems (GIS).
Robot developers and vendors benefit from these exercises by learning firsthand what emergency responders need to perform their roles safely and effectively, and by getting feedback about their systems during mock deployments. The emergency responders benefit by getting to work with a wide variety of high-tech solutions within their own deployment scenarios and to guide robot developers toward answering their needs.
Both communities will benefit from the emerging standard robot test methods being developed as a result of these exercise, which will provide a means of measuring and comparing robot performance to help responders understand the trade-offs of particular devices, and also help measure and compare operator proficiency in performing critical task through remote control interfaces.
This Response Robot Evaluation Exercise is locally hosted by the Texas A&M Engineering Extension Service and the Texas Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) task force team (TX-TF1),
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/06/070609112916.htm
|
"All truth passes through three stages. First, it is ridiculed, second it is violently opposed, and third, it is accepted as self-evident."
Arthur Schopenhauer, Philosopher, 1788-1860
"In the final analysis, our most basic common link is that we all inhabit this small planet, breathe the same air, and we all cherish our children’s future."
John F. Kennedy |
|
Big Bunny
Admin
member is offline
Joined: Apr 2003
Gender: Male
Posts: 50,822
Location: Sydney, Australia
| | Re: Metal Men
« Reply #4 on Jun 11, 2007, 10:47am » | |
Source: National Institute of Standards and Technology
Date: June 11, 2007
Silicon Nanowires Upgrade Data-storage Technology
Science Daily — Scientists at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), along with colleagues at George Mason University and Kwangwoon University in Korea, have fabricated a memory device that combines silicon nanowires with a more traditional type of data-storage. Their hybrid structure may be more reliable than other nanowire-based memory devices recently built and more easily integrated into commercial applications.
As reported in a recent paper,* the device is a type of "non-volatile" memory, meaning stored information is not lost when the device is without power. So-called "flash" memory (used in digital camera memory cards, USB memory sticks, etc.) is a well-known example of electronic non-volatile memory. In this new device, nanowires are integrated with a higher-end type of non-volatile memory that is similar to flash, a layered structure known as semiconductor-oxide-nitride-oxide-semiconductor (SONOS) technology. The nanowires are positioned using a hands-off self-alignment technique, which could allow the production cost--and therefore the overall cost--of large-scale viable devices to be lower than flash memory cards, which require more complicated fabrication methods.
The researchers grew the nanowires onto a layered oxide-nitride-oxide substrate. Applying a positive voltage across the wires causes electrons in the wires to tunnel down into the substrate, charging it. A negative voltage causes the electrons to tunnel back up into the wires. This process is the key to the device's memory function: when fully charged, each nanowire device stores a single bit of information, either a "0" or a "1" depending on the position of the electrons. When no voltage is present, the stored information can be read.
The device combines the excellent electronic properties of nanowires with established technology, and thus has several characteristics that make it very promising for applications in non-volatile memory. For example, it has simple read, write, and erase capabilities. It boasts a large memory window--the voltage range over which it stores information--which indicates good memory retention and a high resistance to disturbances from outside voltages. The device also has a large on/off current ratio, a property that allows the circuit to clearly distinguish between the "0" and "1" states.
Two advantages the NIST design may hold over alternative proposals for nanowire-based memory devices, the researchers say, are better stability at higher temperatures and easier integration into existing chip fabrication technology.
* Q. Li, X. Zhu, H. Xiong, S.-M. Koo, D.E. Ioannou, J. Kopanski, J.S. Suehle and C.A. Richter. Silicon nanowire on oxide/nitride/oxide for memory application. Nanotechnology 18 (2007) 235204.
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/06/070609112909.htm
|
"All truth passes through three stages. First, it is ridiculed, second it is violently opposed, and third, it is accepted as self-evident."
Arthur Schopenhauer, Philosopher, 1788-1860
"In the final analysis, our most basic common link is that we all inhabit this small planet, breathe the same air, and we all cherish our children’s future."
John F. Kennedy |
|
Big Bunny
Admin
member is offline
Joined: Apr 2003
Gender: Male
Posts: 50,822
Location: Sydney, Australia
| | Re: Metal Men
« Reply #5 on Jun 13, 2007, 7:16am » | |
Source: Purdue University
Date: June 13, 2007
Guessing Robots Predict Their Environments, Navigate Better
Science Daily — Engineers at Purdue University are developing robots able to make "educated guesses" about what lies ahead as they traverse unfamiliar surroundings, reducing the amount of time it takes to successfully navigate those environments.
![[image]](http://www.sciencedaily.com/images/2007/06/070612152446.jpg "[image]")
C.S. George Lee, from left, a Purdue professor of electrical and computer engineering, works with doctoral student H. Jacky Chang to operate mobile robots using a software algorithm that enables robots to make "educated guesses" about what lies ahead as they traverse unfamiliar surroundings. The approach reduces the amount of time it takes to successfully navigate those environments. Future research will extend the concept to four robots working as a team to explore an unknown environment by sharing the mapped information through a wireless network. (Credit: Purdue News Service photo/David Umberger)
The method works by using a new software algorithm that enables a robot to create partial maps as it travels through an environment for the first time. The robot refers to this partial map to predict what lies ahead.
The more repetitive the environment, the more accurate the prediction and the easier it is for the robot to successfully navigate, said C.S. George Lee, a Purdue professor of electrical and computer engineering who specializes in robotics.
"For example, it's going to be easier to navigate a parking garage using this map because every floor is the same or very similar, and the same could be said for some office buildings," he said.
Both simulated and actual robots in the research used information from a laser rangefinder and odometer to measure the environment and create the maps of the layout.
The algorithm modifies an approach, called SLAM, which was originated in the 1980s. The name SLAM, for simultaneous localization and mapping, was coined in the early 1990s by Hugh F. Durrant-Whyte and John J. Leonard, then engineers at the University of Oxford in the United Kingdom.
SLAM uses data from sensors to orient a robot by drawing maps of the immediate environment. Because the new method uses those maps to predict what lies ahead, it is called P-SLAM.
"Its effectiveness depends on the presence of repeated features, similar shapes and symmetric structures, such as straight walls, right-angle corners and a layout that contains similar rooms," Lee said. "This technique enables a robot to make educated guesses about what lies ahead based on the portion of the environment already mapped."
Research findings were detailed in a paper that appeared in April in IEEE Transactions on Robotics, published by the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers. The paper was authored by doctoral student H. Jacky Chang, Lee, assistant professor Yung-Hsiang Lu and associate professor Y. Charlie Hu, all in Purdue's School of Electrical and Computer Engineering.
Potential applications include domestic robots and military and law enforcement robots that search buildings and other environments.
The Purdue researchers tested their algorithm in both simulated robots and in a real robot navigating the corridors of a building on the Purdue campus. Findings showed that a simulated robot using the algorithms was able to successfully navigate a virtual maze while exploring 33 percent less of the environment than would ordinarily be required.
Future research will extend the concept to four robots working as a team, operating with ant-like efficiency to explore an unknown environment by sharing the mapped information through a wireless network. The researchers also will work toward creating an "object-based prediction" that recognizes elements such as doors and chairs, as well as increasing the robots' energy efficiency.
Robots operating without the knowledge contained in the maps must rely entirely on sensors to guide them through the environment. Those sensors, however, are sometimes inaccurate, and mechanical errors also cause the robot to stray slightly off course.
The algorithm enables robots to correct such errors by referring to the map, navigating more precisely and efficiently.
"When the robot makes a turn to round a corner, let's say there is some mechanical error and it turns slightly too sharp or not sharply enough," Lee said. "Then, if the robot continues to travel in a straight line that small turning error will result in a huge navigation error in the long run."
The research has been funded by the National Science Foundation.
In separate work, Purdue undergraduate students in a senior design class have developed a prototype firefighting robot called Firebot.
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/06/070612152446.htm
|
"All truth passes through three stages. First, it is ridiculed, second it is violently opposed, and third, it is accepted as self-evident."
Arthur Schopenhauer, Philosopher, 1788-1860
"In the final analysis, our most basic common link is that we all inhabit this small planet, breathe the same air, and we all cherish our children’s future."
John F. Kennedy |
|
Big Bunny
Admin
member is offline
Joined: Apr 2003
Gender: Male
Posts: 50,822
Location: Sydney, Australia
| | Re: Metal Men
« Reply #6 on Jun 21, 2007, 11:12am » | |
![[image]](http://img140.imageshack.us/img140/1469/hrp3prometmarkiiay2.jpg "[image]")
Japanese firm Kawada industry shows off its water-proof robot, the HRP-3 Promet Mark II. The robot is 160cm tall and weighs 68kg. The machine is targeted at the construction industry.
|
"All truth passes through three stages. First, it is ridiculed, second it is violently opposed, and third, it is accepted as self-evident."
Arthur Schopenhauer, Philosopher, 1788-1860
"In the final analysis, our most basic common link is that we all inhabit this small planet, breathe the same air, and we all cherish our children’s future."
John F. Kennedy |
|
Big Bunny
Admin
member is offline
Joined: Apr 2003
Gender: Male
Posts: 50,822
Location: Sydney, Australia
| | Re: Metal Men
« Reply #7 on Jun 22, 2007, 11:44am » | |
Source: Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution
Date: June 21, 2007
New Robotic Vehicles Will Hunt For Life And Hydrothermal Vents On Arctic Seafloor
Science Daily — Scientists and engineers from the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) have just completed a successful test of new robotic vehicles designed for use beneath the ice of the Arctic Ocean. The multidisciplinary research team will now use those vehicles to conduct the first search for life on the seafloor of the world’s most isolated ocean.
![[image]](http://img249.imageshack.us/img249/6324/070621183115qu0.jpg "[image]")
Researchers will use two new autonomous underwater vehicles (AUVs)--Puma and Jaguar--in tandem to locate hydrothermal vent sites on the seafloor of the Arctic Ocean. (Credit: Illustration by E. Paul Oberlander, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution)
WHOI researchers have built two new autonomous underwater vehicles (AUVs) and a new tethered, remote controlled sampling system specifically for the difficult challenges of operations in the Arctic ice. They hope to discover exotic seafloor life and submarine hot springs in a region of the ocean that has been mostly cut off from other ecosystems for at least 26 million years.
The 30-member research team will depart on July 1 from Longyearbyen, Svalbard, for a rare expedition to study the Gakkel Ridge, the extension of the mid-ocean ridge system which separates the North American tectonic plate from the Eurasian plate beneath the Arctic Ocean.
The 40-day cruise on the Oden—a 108-meter long (354-foot) icebreaker operated by the Swedish Maritime Administration—will take researchers close to the geographic North Pole.
The research team for the Arctic Gakkel Vents Expedition (AGAVE) includes specialists in each field of deep-sea exploration, with scientists and engineers from the United States, Norway, Germany, Japan, and Sweden.
WHOI geophysicist Robert Reves-Sohn will serve as chief scientist. Fellow principal investigators include: Tim Shank, a hydrothermal vent biologist from WHOI; Hanumant Singh, a WHOI engineer and vehicle developer; marine chemist Henrietta Edmonds of the University of Texas at Austin, who sailed on the last research expedition to the Gakkel Ridge in 2001; Susan Humphris, a WHOI geochemist who has surveyed dozens of hydrothermal vent sites around the world; and Peter Winsor, a WHOI oceanographer who studies Arctic Ocean circulation and its implications for climate.
“This is an exciting opportunity to explore and study a portion of Earth’s surface that has been largely inaccessible to science,” said Reves-Sohn. “Any biological habitats at hydrothermal vent fields along the Gakkel Ridge have likely evolved in isolation for tens of millions of years. We may have the opportunity to lay eyes on completely new life forms that have been living in the abyss beneath the Arctic ice pack.”
Most of the instrumentation that researchers would normally use to study deep sea environments and organisms—such as the human occupied submersible Alvin or tethered vehicles—cannot be safely operated in the Arctic ice, which can easily crush most small vehicles. So researchers asked Singh and colleagues to design and develop three new vehicles from scratch.
During the July expedition, researchers will use the Puma AUV, or “plume mapper,” to sniff out the chemical and temperature signals of hot, mineral-rich fluids venting out of the ocean floor. Once Puma finds the source of venting, Singh and colleagues will send down the Jaguar AUV, which will use cameras and bottom-mapping sonar systems to image the seafloor. Finally, the CAMPER towed vehicle will be lowered to the seafloor to scoop or vacuum up rocks, sediments, and living creatures.
During a 10-day engineering trial in May and June 2007, all three vehicles were lowered through the Arctic ice and driven underwater, while engineers simultaneously tested acoustic communications techniques. The researchers were able to recover their vehicles from beneath the ice, which can be risky in the midst of moving floes that can quickly close the leads around an icebreaker.
“Anyone can deploy an AUV in the Arctic; the trick is getting it back,” said Singh, who will send his vehicles to the seafloor for 10 to 24 hours at a time during the Gakkel expedition. “In order to have a good day with autonomous vehicles, the number of recoveries must equal the number of launches.”
The Gakkel Ridge extends roughly 1,800 kilometers (1,100 miles) from north of Greenland toward Siberia. It is both the deepest ocean ridge—ranging from 3 to 5 kilometers (1.8 to 3 miles) beneath the ice cap—and the slowest spreading tectonic plate boundary anywhere on Earth. The ridge moves roughly one centimeter (1/3 inch) per year, about 20 times slower than most other ridges.
At most mid-ocean ridges, Earth’s crust spreads apart, allowing hot magma from the mantle to come up and form new ocean crust. The enormous heat sparks chemical reactions between crustal rocks and the seawater that seeps down into them.
These chemical reactions produce hot, mineral-rich fluids that spew like geysers from seafloor vents, as well as massive deposits of minerals, such as copper and zinc. These hydrothermal fluids also contain chemicals that sustain rich communities of unusual life forms, which thrive via chemosynthesis, rather than photosynthesis.
Many geologists believed the Gakkel Ridge region would be too geologically cold to produce hydrothermal vents. And yet during a 2001 expedition, researchers found signs of such venting in the Arctic. Where there are vents, there may be unusual seafloor life forms.
“A few years ago, mid-ocean ridge and hydrothermal vent biologists came together and asked: ‘Where are the key places in the world to go to make big leaps in understanding biodiversity?’ The Gakkel Ridge was one of the top places,” said Shank, who plans to study the genetics of animals found during the expedition.
“The region has been mostly separated from the Atlantic and Pacific oceans for millions of years, so whatever lives there has since been evolving in relative isolation—much the way animals in Australia did," Shank added. "We know that deep-sea Arctic fauna found away from vents are more than 70 percent different from all others around the world. So at hydrothermal vents we are likely to find completely new suites of species with never-before seen adaptations.”
Some scientists—including program managers and scientists from the NASA Astrobiology Program—have been keenly interested in the possibility that Gakkel Ridge may harbor life forms and environmental conditions consistent with primordial Earth or other watery planets.
“The origin of life discussion comes up because the rocks that are exposed on this very slow spreading ridge are not volcanic, but instead come directly from Earth’s mantle,” said Humphris. “The chemistry is very much like the volcanism that occurred on the primordial Earth. If you are thinking about origins of life, you’d like to have an area that is the closest analog to what was happening on the early Earth.”
In July 2001, WHOI researchers were part of the Arctic Mid-Ocean Ridge Expedition (AMORE) that produced the first detailed maps of the Gakkel Ridge and made the unexpected discovery that the ridge is volcanically active. Scientists also found that large sections of Earth’s mantle appear to be deposited directly onto the seafloor along the Gakkel Ridge.
The Gakkel Ridge expedition will be covered live on the web, allowing students, educators, and the general public to follow along with daily dispatches from the Arctic Ocean. The Dive and Discover web site brings students and teachers along on research field trips to read about science in action, while the Polar Discovery project uses photos and live phone calls from the Oden to allow museum visitors and the public to see the Arctic through the eyes of the explorers.
Major funding for the expedition and for vehicle development was provided by the National Science Foundation (NSF) and the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA). Support for the Gakkel Ridge expedition and for underwater vehicle development has been provided by the National Science Foundation’s Office of Polar Programs and Division of Ocean Sciences; the NASA Astrobiology Program; the WHOI Deep Ocean Exploration Institute; and the Gordon Center for Subsurface Sensing and Imaging Systems, an NSF Engineering Research Center.
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/06/070621183115.htm
|
"All truth passes through three stages. First, it is ridiculed, second it is violently opposed, and third, it is accepted as self-evident."
Arthur Schopenhauer, Philosopher, 1788-1860
"In the final analysis, our most basic common link is that we all inhabit this small planet, breathe the same air, and we all cherish our children’s future."
John F. Kennedy |
|
Big Bunny
Admin
member is offline
Joined: Apr 2003
Gender: Male
Posts: 50,822
Location: Sydney, Australia
| | Re: Metal Men
« Reply #8 on Jun 23, 2007, 11:10am » | |
Farms Fund Robots to Replace Migrant Fruit Pickers
Eliza Strickland 06.21.07 | 2:00 AM
![[image]](http://img296.imageshack.us/img296/2226/robopicker630pxlp5.jpg "[image]")
Vision Robotics is developing a machine to trim grapevines in the fall.
Image: Vision Robotics
As if the debate over immigration and guest worker programs wasn't complicated enough, now a couple of robots are rolling into the middle of it.
Vision Robotics, a San Diego company, is working on a pair of robots that would trundle through orchards plucking oranges, apples or other fruit from the trees. In a few years, troops of these machines could perform the tedious and labor-intensive task of fruit picking that currently employs thousands of migrant workers each season.
The robotic work has been funded entirely by agricultural associations, and pushed forward by the uncertainty surrounding the migrant labor force. Farmers are "very, very nervous about the availability and cost of labor in the near future," says Vision Robotics CEO Derek Morikawa.
![[image]](http://img296.imageshack.us/img296/463/robopicker350pxtn0.jpg "[image]")
Agricultural groups hope Vision Robotics can build this harvester to replace labor crews.
Image: Vision Robotics
It's a surprising new market for Vision Robotics, which had been focused on developing consumer devices, including a robotic vacuum cleaner to compete with iRobot's Roomba.
When a member of the California Citrus Research Board approached the company in 2004, Morikawa was doubtful that an effective robotic picker was even feasible. A citrus grower brought the skeptical engineers to an orange farm in California's fertile Central Valley, where they walked down the neat rows of trees and stared at the oranges hanging in the branches.
Previous attempts at making a mechanical harvester were thwarted by inefficiency, explains Morikawa. In the past, experimental machines approached a tree as a human would, picking one piece of fruit and then looking for the next. In this slow process, the machine circled the tree repeatedly until it was sure it had picked all the fruit.
Morikawa says his engineers had their breakthrough idea right there in the orange grove. They realized that the task could be divided between two robots: One would locate all the oranges, and the second would pick them. "Once you know where all the fruit is, then it becomes an easy job to calculate the most efficient way to pick it all," says Morikawa.
![[image]](http://img296.imageshack.us/img296/6310/robopicker2350pxbt7.jpg "[image]")
The eight-armed orange harvester will strip ripe fruit from trees.
Image: Vision Robotics
But it wasn't just technological challenges that held back previous attempts at building a mechanical harvester –- politics got involved, too. Cesar Chavez, the legendary leader of the United Farm Workers, began a campaign against mechanization back in 1978.
Chavez was outraged that the federal government was funding research and development on agricultural machines, but not spending any money to aid the farm workers who would be displaced. In the '80s, that simmering anger merged with a growing realization that the technology was nowhere near ready, and government funding dried up.
This time around, growers' associations are funding the research. By the end of this year, the orange growers will have invested almost $1 million in the project, says Ted Baskin, president of the California Citrus Research Board. He estimates that it will take about $5 million more to get to the finished product.
The farmers are willing to pay up because they've been rattled by a labor shortage over the past few years -- California growers tell horror stories of watching their fruit rot on the trees as they waited for the picking crews to arrive. Last fall, growers rallied in front of the U.S. Capitol, frustrated that Congress still hadn't created a program to ease the passage of foreign guest workers across the Mexico border.
With the supply-and-demand equation uncertain, growers see the robots as a better option. "You can predict what it's going to cost to buy a machine and maintain it," says Baskin. "You can't predict the bargaining that we go through with contract labor," he says.
The two robots would work as a team: one an eagle-eyed scout, the other a metallic octopus with a gentle touch. The first robot will scan the tree and build a 3-D map of the location and size of each orange, calculating the best order in which to pick them. It sends that information to the second robot, a harvester that will pick the tree clean, following a planned sequence that keeps its eight long arms from bumping into each other.
The Vision Robotics engineers are currently building the scout. They expect to have a prototype ready next year, with the harvester to follow two or three years later. Baskin says he doesn't expect the mechanical systems to pose any serious problems. The hard work is writing the software. After the scout robot makes a 3-D map of the tree, it has to evaluate each piece of fruit. What size is the orange? What color is it? Does it have black spots on it? "It's a question of gathering the information, and then judging whether it meets the parameters that are equal to a good orange," Baskin says.
Vision Robotics has been working on that problem for almost four years now, which might give some reassurance to human pickers. The United Farm Workers' leaders say they aren't worried about the robots, because they don't believe the machines will ever be able to do the job as well as people. Spokesman Marc Grossman predicts that mechanical hands will damage the fruit and make it unappealing for supermarket shoppers. "There are already machines that will pick wine grapes, but the high end wine growers don’t use them, because they want the quality," Grossman says.
Farmers don't seem to share that concern. The Washington Tree Fruit Commission started investing in the project last year, and Vision Robotics is talking to other agricultural groups with crops ranging from cherries to asparagus.
http://www.wired.com/science/discoveries....currentPage=all
|
"All truth passes through three stages. First, it is ridiculed, second it is violently opposed, and third, it is accepted as self-evident."
Arthur Schopenhauer, Philosopher, 1788-1860
"In the final analysis, our most basic common link is that we all inhabit this small planet, breathe the same air, and we all cherish our children’s future."
John F. Kennedy |
|
Big Bunny
Admin
member is offline
Joined: Apr 2003
Gender: Male
Posts: 50,822
Location: Sydney, Australia
| | Re: Metal Men
« Reply #9 on Jun 28, 2007, 2:00pm » | |
Robot fleet for hi-tech hospital
A new hospital being built at Larbert in Stirlingshire will be the first in the UK to use a fleet of robots to transport goods and equipment.
![[image]](http://newsimg.bbc.co.uk/media/images/42432000/jpg/_42432900_hospitalrobot_cns_203.jpg "[image]")
The robots will run along separate corridors and use magnetic strips or infra red to find their way around.
The technology is similar to that already used in car plants and can be found in hospitals in France and Japan.
Hospital porters will still be needed to transport patients, while the robots free them from arduous or dirty tasks.
The £300m hospital at Larbert will replace Falkirk and Stirling Royal Infirmaries to provide state-of-the-art facilities for the whole Forth Valley.
It makes sense because robots can do the task more efficiently is certain cases
David Stark
Keppie Design
David Stark, a director of the architectural company Keppie Design which designed the new hospital, said: "Hospitals are a huge facilities management nightmare for people.
"Lots of materials require to get to the right place at the right time. Dirty materials, linens and so on require to be taken away and its a huge logistic exercise."
He said the idea came from visiting hospitals in Japan and France where robots were used.
"They use a mixture of robotics and manual handling. It makes sense because robots can do the task more efficiently is certain cases."
The robots will find their way about the new hospital by either following a metal strip on the floor or by infra-red sensors.
They will be separated from patients, moving down an entirely different network of corridors will be used to transport linen, waste and medical equipment.
Work on the new hospital is expected to be completed by December 2009.
Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/uk_news/scotland/6243616.stm
Published: 2007/06/27 11:49:00 GMT
|
"All truth passes through three stages. First, it is ridiculed, second it is violently opposed, and third, it is accepted as self-evident."
Arthur Schopenhauer, Philosopher, 1788-1860
"In the final analysis, our most basic common link is that we all inhabit this small planet, breathe the same air, and we all cherish our children’s future."
John F. Kennedy |
|
Big Bunny
Admin
member is offline
Joined: Apr 2003
Gender: Male
Posts: 50,822
Location: Sydney, Australia
| | Re: Metal Men
« Reply #10 on Jun 29, 2007, 2:08pm » | |
This is arguably an early step in the future creation of Cyborgs:
Scientists transplant DNA in bacteria
WASHINGTON, June 29 (UPI) -- U.S. researchers have successfully transplanted the entire genome of one species of bacteria into another species.
The work by researchers at the J. Craig Venter Institute was published online in the journal Science.
"The successful completion of this research is important because it is one of the key proof of principles in synthetic genomics that will allow us to realize the ultimate goal of creating a synthetic organism," J. Craig Venter said Friday in a news release.
The scientists transplanted chromosomes to change the bacterial species Mycoplasma capricolum into Mycoplasma mycoides Large Colony (LC) by replacing one organism's genome with the other one's genome, the Venter Institute said.
Venter said synthetic genomics holds great promise in helping to solve issues like climate change and in developing new sources of energy.
Richard Ebright, a molecular biologist at Rutgers University, told The New York Times the transplantation technique was "a landmark accomplishment."
http://www.sciencedaily.com/upi/index.ph....atransplant.xml
|
"All truth passes through three stages. First, it is ridiculed, second it is violently opposed, and third, it is accepted as self-evident."
Arthur Schopenhauer, Philosopher, 1788-1860
"In the final analysis, our most basic common link is that we all inhabit this small planet, breathe the same air, and we all cherish our children’s future."
John F. Kennedy |
|
Big Bunny
Admin
member is offline
Joined: Apr 2003
Gender: Male
Posts: 50,822
Location: Sydney, Australia
| | Re: Metal Men
« Reply #11 on Jun 30, 2007, 10:05am » | |
Source: University of Southern California
Date: June 29, 2007
The Newest Artificial Intelligence Computing Tool: People
Science Daily — A USC Information Sciences Institute researcher thinks she has found a new source of artificial intelligence computing power to solve difficult IT problems of information classification, reliability, and meaning.
That tool, according to ISI computer scientist Kristina Lerman, is people, human intelligence at work on the social web, the network of blogs, bookmark, photo and video- sharing sites, and other meeting places now involving hundreds of thousands of individuals daily, recording observations and sharing opinions and information.
Lerman shared her recent work with others in the burgeoning new field of social information processing a special AAAI-sponsored symposium on the subject March 26-28 at Stanford.
She says that extracting 'metadata' about transactions -- who is talking to whom, who is listening, how conclusions are reached, and how they spread -- can help researchers answer currently refractory problems about documents: their accuracy and quality, their categorization, the relation of their embedded terminology.
One benefit, according to Lerman, who in addition to her ISI appointment, is a research assistant professor at the Viterbi School of Engineering Department of Computer Science at University of Southern California, is automatic determination of the semantics of content from one kind of metadata: tags.
Tags play a crucial role in a longrunning project called the Semantic Web.
For about a decade, she notes, researchers sought a way to organize data so that someone searching for a specific kind of "check" wouldn't have to weed out unwanted references to chess, symbols, verification procedures, financial documents, political science theories and many more.
Tagging seeks to eliminate ambiguities by affixing 'tags,' computer labels peeling apart the multiple meanings of ordinary language into discreet indicators of meaning, guiding computer searches.
But with natural language being as complex as it is, making sense of tags is not easy. Attempts to manually attack the vocabulary and build in the intricate interconnections that signal different word meanings have proved frustrating.
Lerman hopes she's onto another way. Hundreds of thousands of users are now online, chattering away on all kinds of topics. This volume of directed discourse provides a new way to extracting meaning from tags --statistical models.
The process has been called "folksonomy," a collectively constructed informal classification system. Unlike the traditional approach to the Semantic Web, in which a few knowledge professionals try to agree on a formal classification system which will then be used to annotate data, folksonomy emerges from collective tagging activities of many individuals.
New social websites aimed at sharing information such as del.icio.us and Flickr organically grow ways for site members to access each others holdings. Typically, the members themselves spontaneously create a tagging system, encouraged by the site architecture.
The tags emerging from such systems, Lerman and collaborators have found, can be turned to broader purposes.
One of Lerman's initial tagging investigations used the photo-sharing site Flickr, analyzing results returned by a request for images of 'beetles,' including some pictures of insects, some pictures of Volkswagens, and a few other entries.
By extracting the tags that Flickr users had described the images with, and applyng a mathematical technique called the "Expectation-maximization (EM) algorithm," Lerman found it possible to quite accurately separate pictures of insects from pictures of cars returned by the "beetle" search.
Lerman has gone beyond tagging to using metadata to acquire more and more accurate information about the content of documents in social networking situations.
A Lerman paper now in pre-publication on "Social Information Processing in Social News Aggregation" notes: The rise of the social media sites, such as blogs, wikis, Digg and Flickr among others, underscores the transformation of the Web to a participatory medium in which users are collaboratively creating, evaluating and distributing information.
The innovations introduced by social media have lead to a new paradigm for interacting with information, what we call 'social information processing'.
In the paper, Lerman argues that "by tracking stories over time, that social networks play an important role in document recommendation." In addition to providing a platform for document recommendation, social Web enables researchers to study collective user behavior quantitatively.
In the same paper, Lerman also presented a mathematical model of how collaborative rating and promotion of stories emerges from the independent decisions made by many users. She found good agreement between predictions of the model and user data gathered from Digg.
In another paper, examining de.licio.us, Lerman and collaborators "describe a probabalistic model of the user annotation process," and then used the model "to automatically find resources relevant to a particular information domain ... with promising results."
Lerman's collaborators include ISI graduate students Anon Plangprasopchok, and Chio Wong. The research was supported by grants from the National Science Foundation and DARPA.
See papers:
Personalizing Image Search Results on Flickr
http://arxiv.org/abs/0704.1676
Exploiting Social Annotation for Automatic Resource Discovery
http://arxiv.org/abs/0704.1675
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/06/070628162659.htm
|
"All truth passes through three stages. First, it is ridiculed, second it is violently opposed, and third, it is accepted as self-evident."
Arthur Schopenhauer, Philosopher, 1788-1860
"In the final analysis, our most basic common link is that we all inhabit this small planet, breathe the same air, and we all cherish our children’s future."
John F. Kennedy |
|
Big Bunny
Admin
member is offline
Joined: Apr 2003
Gender: Male
Posts: 50,822
Location: Sydney, Australia
| | Re: Metal Men
« Reply #12 on Jul 7, 2007, 10:02am » | |
'Eurobot' a hit with astronauts
COLOGNE, Germany, July 6 (UPI) -- "Eurobot," an eagerly awaited multi-jointed, three-armed robot, has passed its latest exams at the European Astronaut Center in Cologne, Germany.
The "Eurobot" is designed to help astronauts during spacewalks and may prove indispensable during human expeditions to the Moon or Mars, EAC officials said Friday.
Under development since 2003, the tireless robot will give astronauts extra hands and eyes for everything from close-up inspections in hostile space environments to the more mundane job of storing tools and equipment, the EAC said in a release.
"There is a shortage of crew time during all missions, so anything that improves the use of astronaut time is very desirable," said EAC astronaut Jean-Francois Clervoy, who tested the "Eurobot" in a giant pool meant to simulate weightless conditions.
http://www.sciencedaily.com/upi/index.ph....-eu-eurobot.xml
|
"All truth passes through three stages. First, it is ridiculed, second it is violently opposed, and third, it is accepted as self-evident."
Arthur Schopenhauer, Philosopher, 1788-1860
"In the final analysis, our most basic common link is that we all inhabit this small planet, breathe the same air, and we all cherish our children’s future."
John F. Kennedy |
|
Big Bunny
Admin
member is offline
Joined: Apr 2003
Gender: Male
Posts: 50,822
Location: Sydney, Australia
| | Re: Metal Men
« Reply #13 on Jul 7, 2007, 10:35am » | |
Rat-brained robot thinks like the real thing
* 17:08 04 July 2007
* Duncan Graham-Rowe
A robot controlled by a simulated rat brain has proved itself to be a remarkable mimic of rodent behaviour in series of classic animal experiments.
![[image]](http://img72.imageshack.us/img72/5471/dn121921295bx6.jpg "[image]")
When placed in a maze, the robot behaved in a similar way to real rats (Image: Alfredo Weitzenfeld)
The robot's biologically-inspired control software uses a functional model of "place cells". These are neurons in an area of the brain called the hippocampus that help real rats to map their environment. They fire when an animal is in a familiar location.
Alfredo Weitzenfeld, a roboticist at the ITAM technical institute in Mexico City, carried out the work by reprogramming an AIBO robot dog, made by Japanese firm Sony, with the rat-inspired control software.
When placed inside a maze, the robot learnt to navigate towards a "reward" in a remarkably similar way to real rodents, using landmarks to explore.
Rat in a maze
Weitzenfeld found that the robot could recognise places it had already visited, distinguish between locations that looked alike, and figure out roughly where it was when placed in an unfamiliar part of a maze, after just a single training session.
"Our work is unique in that we are trying to reproduce with robots actual experiments carried out on rats," Weitzenfeld told New Scientist.
The robot's tasks were set up to replicate Richard Morris' classic water maze experiments from the 1980s. These were designed to shed light on how spatial problems are solved neurologically.
Weitzenfeld is also working closely with neuroscientists who are experimenting with real rats. "Our goal is to extend our current models by testing new hypotheses in robots," he says, "and by performing corresponding new experiments with real rats that may lead to further understandings in rat spatial memory and learning."
New approaches
One of the challenges in robot navigation is to enable machines to create maps of their surrounding environment, while working out their location at the same time – a challenge known as simultaneous localisation and mapping or SLAM (see Uncharted territory).
"We believe this work will also inspire, in due time, new robotic approaches to SLAM and learning in robots," Weitzenfeld adds.
Chris Melhuish, director of the Bristol Robotics Laboratory says that, while other researchers have performed similar experiments in simulation, these are the first tests to be carried in real environments.
This could make a big difference when it comes to making more robust control software for robots, he says (see Guessing robots navigate faster.
Weitzenfeld agrees. "This increases the complexity, but gives us a better understanding of the true complexity found in real and artificial systems," he says.
http://www.newscientisttech.com/article.ns?id=dn12192&feedId=online-news_rss20
|
"All truth passes through three stages. First, it is ridiculed, second it is violently opposed, and third, it is accepted as self-evident."
Arthur Schopenhauer, Philosopher, 1788-1860
"In the final analysis, our most basic common link is that we all inhabit this small planet, breathe the same air, and we all cherish our children’s future."
John F. Kennedy |
|
Big Bunny
Admin
member is offline
Joined: Apr 2003
Gender: Male
Posts: 50,822
Location: Sydney, Australia
| | Re: Metal Men
« Reply #14 on Jul 9, 2007, 11:28am » | |
Source: University of Southern California
Date: July 8, 2007
Coaching Computer Canines In Clambering
Science Daily — The mutts are metal, the size of toy poodles, with four pointy feet ending in little balls. They need to learn how to make their way on those little feet across a treacherous terrain of broken rocks. University of Southern California roboticist Stefan Schaal has just won renewal of a $1.5 million DARPA contract to train them to do so.
![[image]](http://www.sciencedaily.com/images/2007/07/070705152933.jpg "[image]")
The Boston Dynamics robot clambers over rough terrain. (Credit: Image courtesy of University of Southern California)
Schaal, an associate professor in the USC Viterbi School of Engineering department of computer science, began working on the problem more than a year ago.
Four- and six-legged robots have been walking around for years, he noted — but most just on smooth surfaces where wheels are a more efficient of getting around.
"What you really want legged robots for is to negotiate difficult terrain," he says. " This project is designed to push that envelop."
Boston Dynamics builds the 'bots, which come with an onboard computer chip connected to sensors.
The robot is continually aware of the location of its center of gravity.The strategy for walking, as explained in a paper Schaal presented at the 2007 IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation, was "to adjust a smooth walking pattern generator with the selection of every foot placement such that the center of gravity … follows a stable trajectory."
To do this, the robot calculates where and how it should proceed, "based on the current position, velocity, and acceleration" of its legs. If one effort fails, the dog learns from its mistakes and tries another route the next time.
After 15 months of experimentation — sending back mechanical dog bodies at a rate of about one per month, but saving each one’s digital electronic experience — Schaal's dogs can now move, but not very fast: traveling at 1.6 centimeters a second, a little faster than the old 1.2 cm/sec of the old Mars Sojourner robot.
The goal in the next phase of the study is to triple the speed and double the difficulty of the terrain - have the dogs not just traverse rocky ground, but climb rocky ground with a sharp slope.
If that can be achieved, he says, the programming will move over into bigger mechanical dogs.
Schaal is competing with five other labs at universities and R&D centers around the country. For the first part of the study, Schaal’s former graduate student Dimitris Pongas (CS Ph.D. 07) made significant contributions.
What about making them bark? "Once they can run, I’ll bark for them,” Schaal says.
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/07/070705152933.htm
|
"All truth passes through three stages. First, it is ridiculed, second it is violently opposed, and third, it is accepted as self-evident."
Arthur Schopenhauer, Philosopher, 1788-1860
"In the final analysis, our most basic common link is that we all inhabit this small planet, breathe the same air, and we all cherish our children’s future."
John F. Kennedy |
| |
|
![[Search This Thread]](http://images.proboards.com/search2.gif "[Search This Thread]")
![[Share Topic]](http://images.proboards.com/new/buttons/share.png "[Share Topic]")
![[Print]](http://images.proboards.com/buttons/print.gif "[Print]")
Logged