AI-powered robots have become increasingly sophisticated and are gradually being introduced in a wide range of real-world settings, including malls, airports, hospitals and other public spaces. In the future, these robots could also assist humans with house chores,...
Robotics
Team creates modular continuous robot based on origami-folded tubes
In recent years, roboticists have created a growing number of autonomous systems based on different structures and designs. Among these are modular robots, which are composed of different elements or "modules" that can be reconfigured to carry out specific tasks more...
Teaching robots to tidy up based on user preferences using large language models
Different people tend to have unique needs and preferences—particularly when it comes to cleaning or tidying up. Home robots, especially robots designed to help humans with house chores, should ideally be able to complete tasks in ways that account for these...
A plant-inspired controller that could facilitate the operation of robotic arms in real-world environments
Many existing robotics systems draw inspiration from nature, artificially reproducing biological processes, natural structures or animal behaviors to achieve specific goals. This is because animals and plants are innately equipped with abilities that help them to...
A worm-inspired robot based on an origami structure and magnetic actuators
Bio-inspired robots, robotic systems that emulate the appearance, movements, and/or functions of specific biological systems, could help to tackle real-world problems more efficiently and reliably. Over the past two decades, roboticists have introduced a growing...
A software package to ease the use of neural radiance fields in robotics research
Neural radiance fields (NeRFs) are advanced machine learning techniques that can generate three-dimensional (3D) representations of objects or environments from two-dimensional (2D) images. As these techniques can model complex real-world environments realistically...
Study observes the interactions between live fish and fish-like robots
In recent decades, engineers have created a wide range of robotic systems inspired by animals, including four legged robots, as well as systems inspired by snakes, insects, squid and fish. Studies exploring the interactions between these robots and their biological...
An architecture to coordinate the behavior of different robots in a team
When tackling missions as a team, robots should be able to coordinate their efforts, for instance, completing different sub-tasks, monitoring different parts of a target environment, and so on. Over the past few years, computer scientists have therefore been...
A new hydrogel-based skin with tactile sensing capabilities
An ionic skin that could provide robots with tactile sensation and texture recognition capabilities
Through their fingertips, humans can touch and grip onto things in their surrounding environment, but they can also sense the tactile properties of objects and detect other atmospheric changes. Fingertips are incredibly sensitive parts of our skin, with unique...