Research
LuxAI has announced the launch of its QTrobot for Home, a social robot playmate that helps children with autism to learn and practice new social, emotional, and cognitive skills. After several years of offering QTrobot to schools and research institutes, LuxAI said it can support parents by offering the robot to families.
Immervision has announced a new partner for JOYCE, a humanoid robot that aims to unite the computer vision community. Hanson Robotics, creator of the humanoid robot Sophia, will work with JOYCE to “further evolve machine perception to help deliver human-like vision and beyond,” the companies said.
MIT researchers have developed an algorithm to help engineers design soft robots that collect more useful information about their surroundings. The deep-learning algorithm suggests an optimized placement of sensors within the robot’s body, allowing it to better interact with its environment and complete assigned tasks.
Read more: Researchers’ Algorithm Designs Soft Robots That...
Terradepth, which is developing maritime data collection through unmanned underwater vehicles, has announced the successful completion of its Phase 1 trials. In a test executed at Lake Travis in Travis County, Texas, the company’s unmanned submersible was able to collect underwater data, process it, understand the features of import, and automatically retask itself without human intervention.
Read more: Terradepth Completes Phase 1 Trials of Unmanned...
Piaggio Fast Forward, which develops smart following technology, has collaborated with Trimble to provide a proof-of-concept demonstration that would enable robots and machines to follow humans and other machines in industrial applications.
The Advanced Robotics for Manufacturing (ARM) Institute has announced a collaboration with the Air Force Research Lab (AFRL) on four new technology projects, selected from the institute’s new Directed Project Call process. The AFRL will invest $2.3 million in these projects over the next 18 months.
Drugs can only work if they stick to their target proteins in the body. Assessing that stickiness is a key hurdle in the drug discovery and screening process. New research combining chemistry and machine learning could lower that hurdle. The new technique, dubbed DeepBAR, quickly calculates the binding affinities between drug candidates and their targets. The approach yields precise calculations in a fraction of the time compared to previous state-of-the-art methods.
Read more: Researchers Accelerate Drug Discovery With New...
Reliable Robotics, which is developing autonomous flight technology, announced it completed a series of remotely operated test flights directed by a pilot stationed in its Mountain View headquarters more than 50 miles away. The remote pilot instructed an upgraded Cessna 208 Caravan to taxi, takeoff, maneuver over a populated region and land, while communicating with nearby air traffic through the aircraft’s onboard radios. For the flight, a safety pilot was inside the aircraft for the test.
Unity, which develops a platform for creating and operating real-time 3D content, has released its Object Pose Estimation demonstration, which combines computer vision and simulation technologies aimed at the use of robotics in industrial settings. The new demonstration follows recent releases aimed to support the Robot Operating System (ROS) framework, allowing roboticists to safely, quickly and cost-effectively explore, test, and develop robotic solutions.
Barcelona-based Robotnik has provided some additional details on updates to its RB-CAR, an all-terrain autonomous vehicle it has developed. The vehicle has been designed to carry heavy loads and people, with autonomous and collaborative features to help make tasks in transporting heavy loads more safe.
Hyundai Motor Group has revealed its uncrewed ultimate mobility vehicle (UMV), which it has dubbed TIGER (Transforming Intelligent Ground Excursion Robot). This is the company’s second UMV and the first designed to be uncrewed. The robot aims to carry various types of payloads while traveling over challenging terrain, either as a four-wheel drive vehicle or a four-legged walking machine.
Read more: Video: Watch Hyundai’s Uncrewed Mobility Vehicle...
An interdisciplinary research team from Taiwan’s National Tsing Hua University (NTHU) has developed a robot that can imitate the meticulous movements of a human hand. With sharp senses of vision and touch, the robot’s hands are nimble enough to catch a ball and pull out a tissue. The goal of the robot is to apply these to nursing and rehabilitation applications, which require more agility than robots used in manufacturing.
Australian-based Strategic Elements Ltd. (SOR) announced proof-of-concept work that highlights its printable neuromorphic technology’s potential for data processing and self-learning in soft robotics (touch sensing) and other signal processing applications such as computer vision.
The U.K.’s Defence and Security Accelerator (DASA) has launched a competition seeking innovative ideas from industry and academia that could provide efficiencies for military logistics. The scope of the competition is covering two areas of innovation: autonomy and automation, and additive manufacturing.
Read more: U.K. Launches Competition for Military Logistics...
Motiv Space Systems, in partnership with NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, announced the development of the COLDArm, a robotic arm designed to survive the extreme cold of the Moon’s South Pole. The goal is to usher in a new era of extended space exploration on the Moon, Mars and beyond, the company said in a statement.
Read more: Motiv Space Systems, JPL Announce Robot Arm for...
FANUC America, which provides CNCs and robotics to manufacturers, announced the launch of a new e-learning website aimed to educate the industry about its CRX collaborative robot. The new site provides online training models, a deep dive into several peripheral device and tooling partners, and the latest product information on its CRX cobot lineup.