Robotics

Washing clothes today is far easier and less time consuming that it was mere decades ago, and that's thanks to improved technologies boosting cleaning quality and drying times while decreasing energy consumption. Modern technology has done little to reduce the human element involved in clothes washing, though, meaning you still have to retrieve the dried clothes, fold them, and put them away. Laundroid may change that.

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Who says all drones can do is fly and crash? While nothing in its formal definition limits it as such, drones these days have mostly been associated with unmanned aerial vehicles or UAVs. Robosea, however, is introducing a new kind of UAV, an unmanned aquatic vehicle. BIKI doesn't look like a helicopter but more like a fish, because that is exactly what it is. Meet the world's first bionic underwater robofish drone.

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Airline pilots beware! Yours might be the next job in line to be replaced by robots. Well, maybe not yet soon. In the future, however, robots might indeed take over some tasks deemed either too menial or too distracting for humans. For now, however, DARPA's ALIAS robot, short for Aircrew Labor In-Cockpit Automation System, is content to be a co-pilot and trainer. And to prove its flying chops, it successfully landed a passenger plane. Well, a simulated Boeing 737 cockpit, to be precise.

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Don't worry, no human police officers were harmed in the creation of these mechanical policemen. Though called "Robocop" to give their name a bit more weight and credibility, these are really more robot cops than cyborgs, all metal and computers inside. And these will be the robots that could make up a quarter of Dubai's police force by 2030. And though they currently only patrol the hallways of the Gulf Information Security Expo and Conference (GISEC), they will soon start their public service on streets.

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University of California San Diego mechanical engineering professor Michael Tolley and a team of researchers have created what is said to be the first 'soft' robot that is able to handle traveling on rough terrain. The robot features a total of four legs that were made using 3D-printing, and with them the robot is able to walk across rough surfaces like sand, as well as crawling over larger objects. The company demonstrated the robot's walking capabilities in a video.

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Forget images of sci-fi battles between enhanced soldiers, aliens, and machines. Though it definitely looks like a prototype prop for the Edge of Tomorrow, this exosuit has a less violent and more benign mission. Born from a collaboration between Virginia Tech and home improvement company Lowe's Innovation Lab, the exosuit simply uses the principles of preservation of energy and a few flexible but sturdy materials to make lifting something like a bag of concrete less painful.

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Hardware and home improvement store Lowe's is no stranger to innovative tech -- the company began testing robotic workers at some of its stores late last year, for example. Now the company is back with another development, this one made in conjunction with Virginia Tech -- robotic exosuits (eg, exoskeletons) for warehouse workers. The suits are designed to help workers lift and move heavy items without getting tired as quickly.

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Intel recently took to the stage to introduce Loomo Go, an autonomous delivery robot created by Segway Robotics. The robot can be operated like an actual Segway, at least per the demonstration by Intel CEO Brian Krzanich, but it is much more than that. Using various technologies, Loomo is able to perceive the world around it and operate through it, doing so as part of an overall delivery process to bring humans objects.

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Forget whatever fantasy you might have of artificial limbs. Reality is far more cruel than fiction. Although we do have hi-tech prosthetics today, operating them requires no small amount of effort and time. Even the act of reaching out for a stick can take more than just a few seconds because of the time it takes for our brains to interpret what our eyes see, transmit it to electrical signals, which in turn get interpreted by artificial limbs into movement. That is why biomedical engineers from Newcastle University are trying to cut down the time by giving the artificial arm its own eye and brain.

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Honda has teamed up with Japan's Kyoto University to help spur the development of artificial intelligence. This effort will see the two entities researching and developing such technologies, and doing so with particular goals in mind. Honda envisions a future were AI can collaborate with humans, being integrated into everyday life in a way that is beneficial and able to grow with humans. The company notes that humans would have the 'leading role' in this reality.

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Much like what's suspected of Apple's driverless car strategy, Amazon has been reported to be taking a different approach. Instead of building their own vehicles that'd be able to drive themselves, Amazon is said this week to be working on leveraging the incoming technology. This means Amazon would use autonomous cars made by 3rd-party companies instead of going through the trouble of making their own.

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Mayfield Robotics' Kuri was the surprise hit of CES 2017, but the robot companion isn't relying solely on cutesy looks to charm users, with a new set of features announced today. Intended to bring domestic robotics into the mainstream, Kuri - which looks like a cross between a Roomba and a Wall-E character - is gaining a new set of behaviors that Mayfield calls "romojis" or robot emojis. Although they might look like they're just for entertainment, they're actually going to be pretty important for daily life with the 'bot.

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