David Hayward looks at the next generation of robotics
Robotics is a subject that has always interested us. From watching Robbie the Robot from Forbidden Planet to legendary Class M-3 model B9 General Utility Non-Theorising Environmental Control Robot in Lost in Space.
Of course, the vision of robotics back in the 60s and 70s was somewhat different to today. More modern filming techniques have given us grander visions like the Terminator films and I Robot.
In real life, though, things have been moving forward at an impressive pace in the last decade or so. The mid-90s saw a bit of a lapse in robotics, with nothing startlingly new coming from the technical laboratories of Cal-Tech or Silicon Valley. That did move on, though, with the Honda P2 appearing in the late 90s and Nasa’s PathFinder. Then it stagnated again for a few years. However, a sudden spurt in design, movement in joints and computing power from 2000 onward saw a giant leap in humanoid robot designs.
Take Asimo (Advanced Step in Innovative Mobility), for example. Designed and developed by Honda in October 2000, this is one of the most famous humanoid robots in the world, and it’s still going strong considering its age.
The last five years since then have proved to be another quantum leap in robotics designs, most notably the self-replicating robots designed by Cornell University researchers and the more home-centric Roomba robotic vacuum cleaners.
Robotics, then, as a credible arm of advanced technology, is moving onward once more, despite Professor Stephen Hawking, Elon Musk and Bill Gates getting a little windy over the rise of artificial intelligence.
Join us as we take a look at a few of the current robotics projects that are being developed and see what we could be heading our way in the near future.
Atlas
Atlas is a humanoid robotics project, designed and developed by Boston Dynamics and funded by the United States Defence Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA).
The company was bought by Google in 2013 to help advance its technology, after it put on an amazing display with previous designs such as the BigDog, Cheetah, LittleDog, RiSE and PETMAN. The robotics from Boston Dynamics are designed with safety, search and rescue, and military applications in mind. The BigDog, for example, is designed to be a pack mule for soldiers when in rough terrain, and the PETMAN is a bipedal construction designed to test chemical suits.
Atlas, on the other hand, is a more advanced version of PETMAN. It stands at around six feet tall and has been carefully constructed to allow the robot to move around almost any terrain, much like a human. This means it’s ideal for search and rescue missions, where the arms need to be free to manipulate or carry something (or someone), while the legs provide the motion.
It’s also being fitted to be able to function as a repair robot in situations where it’s impossible for a human to survive – for example, a Fukushima or Chernobyl-like nuclear disaster zone.
In theory, we send in a robot, and we’ll be able to remotely repair or shut off whatever may be causing a radiation or dangerous chemical leak, without any rescue personnel being in harm’s way.
The robot’s specifications make for a fascinating read. It has two arms, two legs, a torso, a head, 28 hydraulically actuated high performance joints with closed loop positioning and force control, an on-board real-time control computer, crash protection system, modular wrists that can be fitted with specialised hands, a head-mounted sensor with LIDAR (Light Detection and Ranging, a laser targeting system for measuring distance and light), stereo cameras and a special set of perception algorithms to help the robot discover and analyse its current environment.
Recently, Atlas received an upgrade to its wrist joints, allowing it to be able to open doors by turning the handle, and an added battery pack that will allow it to roam freely without tripping over its power cord – or cutting it, as it did earlier in the year.
The 3.7kWh lithium-ion battery will limit Atlas to around an hour’s use in the field, which includes tasks such as walking up stairs, carrying a heavy load and tool use. The hydraulics, though, have been upgraded with a new variable pressure pump, which will help save the battery life somewhat by allowing the controller to apply light to mid-level pressure for most normal duties, then upping the pressure to maximum for heavier tasks.
Atlas was one of the finalists in the Darpa Robotics Challenge competition in 2013 – a competition that’s designed to test the future of robotics for use in challenging environments that require robotic assistance.
Although the competition that year was ultimately won by a robot called Schaft, a University of Tokyo robot (incidentally, also owned by Google), Atlas seems to have come out of it with a little more renown – probably because the winner, Schaft, looked more like a walking cash machine than the more humanoid design of Atlas.
Nevertheless, robotics has once again become the buzz word that’s on the collective lips of the media and those who think that Ultron or the Terminator are but mere years away from becoming our robot overlords. And we have Atlas to thank for that attention.
DRC-Hubo
Moving on from Atlas, DRC-Hubo is this year’s winner of the Darpa competition. This is a design from a team hailing from the Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (KAIST), and it’s quite unique in the way it functions.
Rather than opting for an all-out bipedal robot, the team instead focused on DRCHubo’s ability to semi-transform into a wheeled robot by kneeling down. Then, when needed, the robot could stand up again and become bipedal for whatever task was necessary.
This was the winning factor for the Korean team, as Jun Ho Oh, a professor of mechanical engineering said, “Bipedal walking on robots isn’t very stable yet. The slightest thing goes wrong and the result is catastrophic.”
To increase the stability, then, as well as allow the robot to function properly in a humanoid environment, the team minimised the risks of Hubo falling over by simply adding wheels on the knees and letting the robot drop to them when faster motion was required.
DRC-Hubo is a little shorter in stature than Atlas, standing at just 5’ 3” and weighing slightly less too. However, it does have a better operating battery life, at just over two hours. Furthermore, Hubo has three cameras set up in its head, allowing it to perceive objects in 3D, as well as an advanced LIDAR type system to judge distances.
There are seven motors and seven motor drivers controlling the arms, which gives the robot a more human-like manoeuvrability and dexterity. And of course, not only can it walk on two legs, but it can traverse a flat surface on its knee-wheels at a speed of around 2km/h – so don’t worry, it’s not going to be chasing after us just yet.
DRC-Hubo is the latest Hubo-based model to come from KAIST, with former versions (the KHR-0, KHR-1, KHR-2 and Hubo 2 and 2-plus) advancing from one generation to the next in terms of the processing power, as well as the mechanics. Oddly, there’s also an Albert Hubo version, which has a body much like that of Honda’s Asimo and a rubber head of Albert Einstein.
The next-generation model of Hubo is currently kept under wraps by KAIST. Since winning the Darpa competition and the subsequent $2 million prize fund along with it, the team has been accepting funding and donations of time and resources from a number of technology groups, research centres and mechanical institutes. What the team will come up with next isn’t clear, but we’re fairly sure it’s going to be pretty hard to beat.
MEDI
Moving away from the rescue and military applications of robot design, we now look at MEDI, a 23” tall mini-robot that is designed to act as a pain coach for children in hospitals and doctor’s surgeries.
Deployed by RX Robots, MEDI is designed to be as toy-like as possible while still having a high degree of technology on hand. The idea is simple enough: MEDI is able to perform a number of functions such as dancing and singing, and it can converse to a limited degree with a child regarding the procedure they’re going to have performed on them.
For example, if a child is about to have a blood test, MEDI will talk to the child and ask if it’s okay for him/her to sit with them and explain what’s going on, while showing empathy toward the child during the test. It’s actually quite a fascinating robot.
MEDI looks a little like Twiki from Buck Rogers, but is actually another robot called Nao, designed by Aldebaran Robotics. The difference here is that RX Robots have loaded a Nao up with cognitive-behavioural software so it can interact better with children.
MEDI, or the Nao core if you prefer, is made up of a 25 degrees of freedom with actuated limbs, accelerometer, gyrometer and four ultrasonic sensors. In addition, there’s also a pair of HD cameras, four microphones, a sonar rangefinder, two infrared emitters and receivers, nine tactile sensors and eight pressure sensors.
MEDI is actually a little more home-based when it comes to the processing involved, as it uses an Intel Atom 1.6GHz processor with 2GB of memory and a 512GB SSD – with further expansion available. It runs a Linuxbased operating system called NAOqi 2.0, but it can be controlled and interacted with using Windows or Mac OS if needed.
The lithium-ion battery is capable of running MEDI for around 90 minutes, with walking, talking and manipulating of its arm movements. If it’s just sitting still and interacting with the sensors and ‘speaking’ to the patients, then that time is extended to well over a couple of hours.
According to clinical studies, with MEDI being in operation in a children’s hospital in Alberta, Canada, interaction with MEDI can result in a child feeling up to 50% less pain than if an adult nurse or doctor were talking to them. Naturally, there’s an element of fascination here, which is a distraction technique for the child in question. But hey, if it works and the child doesn’t feel quite as much pain or is a lot more comfortable in a hospital, then it’s worth every penny.
Robots And Empire
As you can well imagine, robotics isn’t going to fade away anytime soon, but with this new generation of robotics comes something that’s not so pleasing to read about.
Autonomous weapon systems are now the questionable mechanics of the day, with landand sea-based projectile weapons, capable of wiping out something from a range of a few miles away, not to mention drones crowding the skies with their ever watchful cameras. It’s no surprise that conversations over the rise of the killer robot are never far away.
Should we ban autonomous weapons? Do drones need to be removed from over civilian populated areas? Then again, if warring with robots reduces human casualties, should we ban their use in modern warfare?
There are too many questions to answer in this small segment, but nevertheless they’ll keep the media going for a while with talk of a robot-led Armageddon.
For now, let’s just enjoy the idea that robots are here to help humanity advance into the next few decades and aid us in our exploration of the unknown.
Other Notable Modern Robots
Aside from the three robots we briefly looked at here, here are a few more notable projects to track down:
THORMANG: Designed by the Seoul National University, THORMANG is a humanoid robot designed for rescue and repair in hazardous situations.
BugBots: These are water-hopping-insect-inspired micro-robots are able to walk on water just below the maximum force that the water tension can withstand. iCub: the iCub is created by the RobotCub Consortium, made up from several European universities. It’s a humanoid design but with a very scary babylooking head.
Poppy: Poppy is a 3D-printed robot with an articulated spine, with five separate motors and a further 20 motors to help move the limbs of its humanoid design. Also, it’s only 84cm tall.
Romeo: Romeo, which sounds a little dodgy for a robot, is designed as the next generation in personal care. It’s about 1.4 metres tall and is designed from the Nao.
Actroid-SIT: Probably the scariest of the bunch here. Actroid-SIT is a female android that is capable of interacting with you, shaking your hand and answering a limited amount of questions. If you fancy being creeped out a little, then look it up.