Hasta La Gadget!

After creating a robot bird and dragonfly, automation company Festo shows off with another impressive animal replica. Like real kangaroos, Festo’s BionicKangaroo is not only great at jumping and keeping its balance, it can also store the energy generated from landing and use it for the next jump.

BionicKangaroo uses a combination of pneumatic actuators and electric servos to move and keep its balance.

According to Festo, the robot has an rubber elastic spring element that acts like an Achilles tendon: “It is fastened at the back of the foot and parallel to the pneumatic cylinder on the knee joint. The artificial tendon cushions the jump, simultaneously absorbs the kinetic energy and releases it for the next jump.”

To make the robot even fancier, Festo also made it so it can be controlled with gestures. The company uses the Myo armband to make BionicKangaroo move, stay or rotate in place. Watch BionicKangaroo hip hip hop and not stop:

It would’ve been way cooler if they made a BionicTigger instead. Check out Festo’s report (pdf) if you want to learn more about BionicKangaroo.

[via Ubergizmo]

Exoskeletons used to be the stuff of dreams, where my first exposure to an exoskeleton was when Ellen Ripley went mano a mano with the Alien Queen. Over the years, however, technology has advanced to such a degree that it might feature in our day-to-day lives. After all, one can already rent the Honda Walking Assist Exoskeleton in Japan, and for four-year old Hannah Mohn, it is a robot exoskeleton that has literally given her a new lease of life, enabling this little girl to lift her arms when she was previously unable to do so.

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Robot Exoskeleton Allows 4-Year Old Girl Work Her Arms original content from Ubergizmo.

Have you ever hopped on a Segway before? Those who have given it a go would realize what fun it is to not walk any more, although after a while (and when the batteries run out), you would have realized that one of the small pleasures in life would include walking, taking in the scenery around you, not to mention being able to get some exercise going on. Still, it is an engineering marvel to see the Segway balance a human without toppling over. The £99.99 MiP is one robot that has been inspired by the Segway I believe, since it lays claim to being the world’s first balancing robot.

Arriving in either black or white shades, it balances all by itself, and can be controlled using a futuristic manner – via hand gestures, instead of a normal remote control. Hmmm, I wonder whether it would short circuit itself if you were to flip the bird? Anyways, the MiP robot is full well capable of balancing all by itself, all the while carrying its own bodyweight that is roughly equivalent to that of a can drink. Not only that, it will also boast of 7 unique and exciting game modes, where the free app can be used to have it drive, dance, balance and battle. It will run on a quartet of AAA batteries, so using rechargeables might be a good idea in the long run.
[ MiP is world’s first balancing robot copyright by Coolest Gadgets ]

Israel is a hotbed of technology and research, being an oasis of sorts in the desert, too. Still, water is a precious commodity, and all effort must be made to conserve as much water as possible. Ketura Sun, a large commercial solar field in Israel, has a special method of cleaning its solar panels using robots. What makes these robots special would be the fact that they do not need to make use of any water at all throughout the cleaning process, ensuring that they thrive in their jobs while being in the Negev desert.

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Ecoppia E4 Robots Clean Solar Panels Without Using Water original content from Ubergizmo.

If you’re an astronaut on your way to Mars, there aren’t too many options if your appendix bursts. That’s why a Nebraska-based technology company has developed mini robot space surgeons that can actually climb inside of astronauts’ bodies. The first zero-gravity tests on the machine are about to begin.

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