Rex Bionics, a New Zealand company has developed a set of robotic legs that enables paraplegics to walk again. With the Rex robotic exoskeleton paraplegic can walk on hard surfaces, turn, go up the starts and more…for a 150 000 $ price-tag.
Although the concept is interesting, the kiwis will need to drop the price a little (or preferably a lot) and improve the motion speed which is rather slow at the moment. Regardless, we are not in a position to judge how much walking would cost for a disabled person (even at low speeds).
Despite the great difficulty of this task (who hasn’t wasted a few pancakes attempting this and eventually gave up?) this robot does not get discouraged and keeps trying until it finally succeeds and successfully learns the skill. The fluidity of the manipulator motion in the last trial is remarkable and the way it attempts repeatedly and fails is very human-like.
See the video below for pancake flipping robotic action:
Bielefeld University has unveiled their humanoid robot which features curiosity and learning capabilities. The Roboter asks what an object is by pointing at it with its Shadow Hands and learns the objects name and grasping pattern from a human trainer. The robots features curiosity in the sense that it wishes to learn every object that is presented to it.
The video below illustrates the robot’s capabilities
The possibilities that this enables are almost endless. Especially when considering that now Arduino Shields can be used in order to extend the capabilities of the Lego NXT parts.
Today is a great day in the history of GoRobotics.net. This year (which also marks the 10 year anniversary of GoRobotics.net), RobotShop has taken on the mission of continuing the legacy or Mr. William Cox, the founding father of GoRobotics.net, by maintaining and further expanding the community by continuing to post interesting robotics projects, news and by sharing our experience for everyone to enjoy.
Just like William, we at RobotShop are truly passionate about robots and happy to be part of a community that is equally enthusiastic and interested in everything robotic. We are happy to join GoRobotics.net, and to tackle the challenge of bringing you the latest and greatest developments in this rapidly expanding field.
Besides reporting on cool robotic projects selectively chosen from around the internet, we will initially publish the How to Make a Robot, Grand Tutorial Series. These are going to be a series of detailed tutorials on how to get started with robotics by guiding you through the process of making a simple, general purpose mobile robot. It’s our way of thanking you for your sustained interest and enthusiasm.
What does it mean for the RobotShop Blog?
It means that the RobotShop Blog has now a partner site that will focus mainly on robotic projects and DIY robots. It is like having a technically inclined brother or cousin who fixes your computer (or your robot) once in a while, and brags about his new tools or hacks.
Robots are becoming highly advanced and, in an effort to become energetically independent, they now poop. Ecobot III is a robot capable of extracting energy from food by digesting it and ultimately getting rid of the leftover waste (i.e. it poops). It was created by Researchers at the UK’s Bristol Robotics Laboratory
This reminds us of EATR, the vegan robot, but the Ecobot III eats partially processed sewage (yummy!) instead of vegetables .
What is better to promote a “green lifestyle” than a giant robot? A giant Optimus Prime made from old car junk.
Optimums Prime made from junk
This jaw dropping sculpture weights 6 tons and stands 10m tall. it features the very well known and beloved Optimus Prime from the Transformers series. It was created as part of the Green Dream Park and stands next to the “Bird’s Nest” Olympic stadium in Beijing. (probably to protect it from giant extraterrestrial birds).
We suspect this robot, among with its other giant friends, to be an invader from outer space. Only this explains the rapid proliferation of such giant “sculptures”.
Do not worry, the robot invasion and occupation has not started yet, we can still enjoy a few extra years of freedom. These, so called, Androïdes are actually humans in disguise (who would have guessed?). Actually, they are more than just humans, they are hip-hop dancers from the Aircompagnie, a French dance troupe. They will be performing in the streets of Montreal for the next week until July 25th.
Below you can see a video where they do a bit more than just “the robot”.
Intel has been developing for some time a Home Exploring Robotic Butler (HERB, for the relatives). It features, among other things, two Barrett arms with grippers (since it was upgraded from the previous one-armed version) , a Segway RPM base, and a Hokuyo UTM-30LX Scanning Laser Rangefinder. The robot brain is an Intel i7 processor running Linux.
Intel is not going to be selling robots any time soon. They have developed this robot in order to improve and create adaptive algorithms for navigation and object manipulation in changing unstructured environments.
All Nippon Airways (ANA) has created a custom jet displaying a life-sized Gundam painting on one side and the Gundam logo on the other. This, along with the giant (life-sized) Gundam statue and a Gundam Café in Tokyo, has been created in order to commemorate the 30th anniversary of the Gundam comic in Japan.
We cannot wait to see a fully fonctional (anr at least moving) life-sized gundam.
As a final note, “life-sized” does not seems very appropriate term for something that has never existed in real life.
