Robotics

Human beings make tools. Animals make tools. A tool gives an advantage over adversity and guarantees survival. Will the same happen if a robot makes a tool?

Researchers at ETH Zurich are on a mission to not only have robots make tools, but they are teaching the bots how to use them. Their goal is to simplify the complexity of this type of robot, while at the same time giving it extraordinary capabilities like creating its own parts, fixing itself, and even creating other robots from printed parts and integrated motors.

So far, their robot consists of a mechanical arm with Hot Melt Adhesive (HMA) capabilities. This means that at the end of the mechanical arm is just a hot glue gun that can be used to create parts layer by layer. In their effort to avoid complexity, it has no manipulator mechanisms, instead it only uses the stickiness of the printed parts to move them and place them.

The project has only just been started. In a demonstration of their progress, ETH researchers showed that their robot is capable of creating tools and thus performing tasks that it would not be able to do otherwise. It took the robot about an hour, but it was able to create a cup with a handle to transport water, an impressive task for a robot with no hands.

Next, the team or researchers are working to give the robot perception capabilities to eventually achieve a completely autonomous robot. At the moment, the robot can only create simple shapes in about an hour’s time; a long way away from creating an entire mechanism, but even bots need to take it one HMA layer at a time.

Eavesdropper

As I am sure your mother told you, dogs are a huge responsibility to take care of, and if you don’t have the time, chances are you do not have the energy. But, this does not deter many people from getting dogs anyways. For this reason, the company Go-Go Dog Pals has created an interactive dog toys that run on energy that is not your own.

The latest Go-Go Dog Pals creation is a remote control car designed to withstand the predatory chase of the dog. This is not your ordinary dog toy, it comes with a dual 280mm high torque motors, its 4 wheel drive, double suspension so it can be driven on many terrains. The chassis resembles a groundhog, and is made of a smooth durable plastic. The most impressive feature, it can go as fast as 21 mph.

The idea is that you sit back have fun controlling  the Go-Go Dog Pal while watching your dog go crazy in the chase. It is difficult to actually catch the toy because of its smooth chassis except for its tail. But if your dog does catch the antenna tail, it only weighs 3.9 pounds so there is no worries of pulling it out. Even if Rufus does fulfill its killer instinct, all parts are replaceable.

The remote uses a long distance 2.4 GHz digital radio control system and the Go-Go Pal comes with a rechargeable Ni-Cd battery and a cool $300 price tag. We love our dogs, so what is $300?

The complete system (via Go-Go Dog Pals)

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Arduino robot used for promotion of RobotC (via RoboMatter)

Robotics and software coding can be daunting to a beginner, but software company RoboMatter works diligently to make these fields accessible to beginners and hobbyist. Their software is already compatible with LegoMindstorm and others platforms alike that aim at brining robotics to the main stream. Now, RobotC has announced they will expand their code to be compatible with one of the biggest development  board platform there is, Arduino.

RobotC has released a public BETA version of their code for Arduino. To use RobotC with your existing Arduino, the Arduino will have to be updated to version 3.12. Once this is done, the same version of RobotC is compatible with Arduino as well as NXT, Cortex. This new version will support the Diecimila, Duemilanove, MEGA 1280 and MEGA 2560 and UNO Arduino boards.

This BETA version is free for the public all summer long and can be downloaded from the RobotC website.

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