Simon Fraiser University researchers have taken a page from the gecko “walk on any surface” handbook and applied it to a robot that looks a bit like a tank.
If you’ve never seen a gecko just hanging out on glass, it’s rather amazing. Not a whole lot of animals the size of a gecko can manage to just stand there on glass like it’s nothing.
Today’s groundbreaking entry into the Uncanny Valley is a pair of mechanical, robot legs that are propelled entirely by their own weight: they can walk with a human-like gait without motors or external control. If this sounds too good (or crazy) to be true, watch the first video at the end of the story, wipe the tendrils of drool off your chin, and then find your way back up here for an explanation.
Without making this accomplishment any less awesome, these robot legs — called BlueBiped, and made by researchers at the Nagoya Institute of Technology in Japan — are basically just an imitation of human physiology. There are thighs and lower legs made out of aluminium that are the same length as their human counterparts, and ankles and knee joints for articulation, but… that’s it. No sensors, no computers, no “musculature” — the legs are completely passive, you just give them a push… and they carry on walking. As long as there’s a slight downwards slope, anyway — there has to be some source of energy, after all, and in this case it’s gravity.
Forget Apple’s Siri voice recognition technology taking over the world. I have seen two robots playing ping-pong and now I am truly scared for humanity.
Named “Wu” and “Kong”, these two human-sized robots are the products of China’s Zhenjiang University. They play ping-pong not only against each other, but will take on humans as well. In the video, it’s clear they’re as adept at forehand shots as they are at the backhand.
When you think about it, smartphones are more than just fancy phones – they’re actually tiny portable computers. Given that so many people now own these tiny computers, why should they have to pay to buy another computer that’s built into an electronic device, when they could instead just use their existing smartphone as the “brain” of that device? That’s the approach that has been taken by products such as the Bubo camcorder rig, and now also by Romo-The Smartphone Robot.
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