A humanoid robot is
slowly but surely emerging from our labs. That is good news. The human configuration is essentially the
best system nature has yet designed for optimizing tool use and actual
locomotion. We can likely do as well or
even much better.
Once you exclude the
damage of dirt and soil then we have an effective machine to assist
particularly in environmental management.
As we have posted, advanced biome management requires demolishing
wastage in particular in order to optimize fecundity and diversity. Humanoid robot assistance is a clear
solution.
Thus the ultimate
future of agriculture surely includes humanoid robots to assist managing the
forests in particular. Flat fields are
easy for wheeled equipment but irregular forests are not so forgiving while
real slopes often need bipedal systems.
Video: iStruct robot
ape stands upright thanks to its active spine
October
31, 2013
Back
in June the world got its first glimpse of the iStruct,
a robot ape developed at the German Research Center for Artificial Intelligence
(DFKI) and the University of Bremen. We predicted that in addition to the
stability afforded by walking on all fours, the robot ape could feasibly stand
up to free its hands for other kinds of work. Now the team has published a
video that shows how their robot accomplishes this maneuver with the help of
its flexible spine and sensitive feet.
In
email correspondences with Daniel Kühn, iStruct's primary researcher, he
explained that while it's referred to as a "space robot" (and is
being tested in a mock lunar landscape), his focus was designing
biologically-inspired robotic structures.
Years
earlier he had designed the LittleApe, a much smaller, light-weight ape robot
that had a flexible spine and simple feet. "The LittleApe robot was able
to walk and to climb a fence, but the passive spine was, or is, a limiting
factor," Kühn explains. And its single-contact feet, while good for a prototype,
needed to be improved. That's where the iStruct takes things to the next level.
Currently,
it may only stand and maintain its balance. However,
its multi-contact feet could provide the necessary data to maintain the robot's
balance as it transitions from a quadrupedal to bipedal gait. "There are
only a few robots out there with an actuated spine that are actually moving and
walking around," Kühn says. "We want to investigate whether it is
beneficial for the locomotion or not – but we think it is. For example, in a
two legged posture we have an increased arm range of motion, since the spine is
active."
Recently,
Boston Dynamics has proven than an actuated spine can help with locomotion;
its WildCat quadruped is currently the fastest in the
world, thanks in part to the flexing action of its spine. However, there are
robots in development for the DARPA Robotics Challenge that will attempt to
perform a similar move from four to two legs without a sophisticated spine.
Both the DRC-HUBO, developed primarily in South
Korea, and Carnegie Mellon University's CHIMP robot, are designed with the
ability to move on all fours before transitioning to an upright posture for
doing manual work.
Despite
its successes, the iStruct won't be exploring lunar craters any time soon.
"We are far away from the Red Planet robot AMEE," Kühn admits, and
the project is due to wrap soon. Still, you can see it stand upright and twist
and turn using its spine in the following video, which is pretty impressive in
its own right.
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