Hasta La Gadget!

We’ve seen KIST‘s Marhu robot tooling around here before, but now they’re showing off the latest models, the Mahru-Z (with some help from Mahru-M), in some super useful scenarios. Mahru-Z and M have been successfully demonstrating their service abilities by carrying cups of tea, and retrieving toast from toasters and delivering it as well. The Z-version bot is a bit shorter than previous iterations, and also sports different, more dextrous arms. He stands about 4 feet 3 inches tall and weighs 122 pounds. Both bots are networked and use 3D object recognition in their task completion. Overall, the improvements to the Mahru bots are iterative, but it sure is great to hear that one day we’ll have someone to bring our breakfast to us in bed. Video is after the break.

Continue reading KIST Mahru-Z waits on you very, very slowly

KIST Mahru-Z waits on you very, very slowly originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 18 Jan 2010 18:14:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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This is not the first time we’ve heard about a robotic hummingbird, but they’re still a rare enough species to warrant our attention. Japanese researchers at Chiba University near Tokyo have developed a new bot which behaves much like the quick-winged bird, which is controlled by an infrared sensor. The little birdie weighs in at less than an ounce and can fly in a figure eight, moving up, down, left and right. Next steps for its development — which the researchers say will arrive by 2011 — include the ability for it to hover mid-air, and have a small camera attached to it. Ultimately, its creators see the robot (which has cost around 2 million dollars to develop) being able to help search for people in dangerous situations, such as destroyed buildings, or aiding in the search for criminals. We haven’t gotten a look at the little guy yet (the above photo is merely to whet your imagination), but we anxiously await its arrival.

Japanese researchers develop robotic, heroic hummingbird originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 28 Dec 2009 12:01:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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We’ve seen humanoid bots ranging from the cute to the downright insane with none of them ever coming close to commercial viability, but stick an Eee in front of their name and all bets are off. ASUS, the company that started the seemingly unlikely netbook revolution (sorry, FIC), is about to apply its golden touch to the field of consumer-friendly robotics. Intended to serve as an educational tool for young children to interact with, the EeeBot will be driven by a modified version of the aptly titled Android OS and ASUS is said to be hard at work developing a content and services ecosystem around the hardware. Teased technologies include voice, video and navigation abilities, but we’ll have to wait a while before we see any of it since production won’t begin for another two years.

ASUS says EeeBots are coming, inevitably running Android OS originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 17 Dec 2009 04:09:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Continue reading Tetra the micromouse needs no cheese, completes maze in under five seconds (video)

Tetra the micromouse needs no cheese, completes maze in under five seconds (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 12 Dec 2009 08:11:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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NEPTUNE Canada, the world’s largest undersea cabled network, has powered up and will begin streaming data from hundreds of undersea instruments and sensors on the Pacific Ocean floor to the Internet, Scientific American reports.

The network will run around the clock and is expected to produce 50 terabytes of data each year. The data will include information about earthquake dynamics, deep-sea ecosystems, salmon migration, and the effects of climate change on the water column, the report said.

“It’s revolutionary in that it brings two new components into the ocean environment, which are power and high-bandwidth Internet,” says Project Director Chris Barnes, from the project’s offices at the University of Victoria in British Columbia, in the article. “We’re really on the verge of wiring the oceans.”

Shown in the photo is a rat-tail fish checking out the installation of a seismometer at “node ODP 1027” of the new network–buried at a depth of 2,660 meters underneath the surface. (Image credit: NEPTUNE Canada/CSSF)