The Daily Galaxy: News from Planet Earth & Beyond

Your New Borg Companion

You know how you’ve been wanting a hot android companion programmed to reply, "Yes dear, you're absolutely right” in response to everything you say? Well, here’s some scientific justification for it; a new study has found that robot companionship is as good as the real thing. Well, at least when it comes to dogs. But in theory it may apply to human companionship too, since previous studies have found that a dog companion is better than a human friend in regards to health benefits.

RoboMoth: Scientists Create Robot Driven by Moth's Brain

Researchers at the University of Arizona have created a 6-inch-tall wheeled robot driven by brain impulses of a moth. The creation offers insights into the mechanism of the brain and how it works. As the moth observes activity around it, the signals from its brain are translated and sent to a computer that directs the robot to turn toward wherever the moth is looking.

The moth's vision has evolved over millions of years to accurately guide the insect as it dodges predators or seeks mates. Although the moth brain is the size of a grain of rice, the insect's ability to detect motion is "amazing -- beyond anything we could build," said Charles M. Higgins, UA associate professor of electrical and computer engineering.

   

Scientists Say Sperm is the Ideal Model for Bio-Robots

In many ways, Sperm is the perfect biological delivery system. It generates it’s own energy, can traverse rough terrain and knows how to hone in on its target to deliver the goods. While sperm delivers DNA, Cornell researchers are now borrowing ideas from sperm to provide energy for nanoscale robots aiming to deliver medication from nanosized medical devices.

Geeks & Rock Stars: Gibson Launches World’s First Robot Guitar

This week a self-tuning guitar with robotic technology will launch to the delight of robot enthusiasts and rock stars alike. The guitar will let you jam out some heavy metal chords and then instantly retune for some lighter fare. The robot has a better “ear” than humans, which allows the guitar to instantly self-tune to a standard setting with six tuning presets the musician can switch to by pushing a button as they’re rocking out. The instruments are the first of their kind to have robotic ability. It works by a device in the bridge monitoring the pitch of the guitar. Motorized tuners automatically adjust the pitch of the strings.

"The Blanket Project"- How we Perceive Robot Interaction

The Blanket Project is a "behavioral sculpture" created by Nicholas Stedman, an interactive artist who is currently teaching and studying at the media robotics lab of the University of Buffalo. An ongoing project, it aims to create a fully autonomous robotic blanket that can "navigate through a bedroom or similar environment seeking out people for intimate encounters."

Carnegie Mellon Moon-Robot Whizzes Assembling Team for Google's $30 Million Lunar X-Prize

Researchers in the Robotics Institute of Carnegie Mellon University's School of Computer Science are building a robotic prospector for NASA that can creep over rocky slopes and then anchor itself as a stable platform for drilling deep into extraterrestrial soils.

RoboCup World Finals July '07 -Video

The University of Freiburg's NimbRo won all finals against Japan's Team Osaka of the Humanoid League at RoboCup 2007 held this July in Atlanta.

Freiburg's current research centers on the development of humanoid robots that are able to improve their behavior through learning. This includes the design of robot hardware, as well as algorithms for perception and behavior control. Application areas are RoboCup soccer and intuitive multimodal communication with humans as a museum guide.

Posted by Jason McManus.

Video

Researchers Design Funny ‘Bot' That Can Understand Humor

Finally you’ll have a friend who will laugh at your stupid jokes—never mind that it’s a robot.

University of Cincinnati researchers Julia Taylor and Larry Mazlack recently unveiled a "bot" (actually for now it’s still just a software program) that recognizes jokes. They recently reported the development at the American Association for Artificial Intelligence conference in Vancouver, Canada.

Robots Rising -Scientists are Worried

The Japanese, culturally speaking, tend to love robots. Right now in Japan, you can buy a robot “babysitter” known as the PaPeRo. Because it is capable of face recognition, it “remembers” individuals and can tell you if a child is missing from the group. It can talk, sing and dance. More importantly, it can transmit what it “sees” to absent parents through a cell phone. Parents can talk to their children through the robot’s “voicebox”.

Robots Simulate Darwin's Natural Selection -Daily Discovery

The New Scientist reports that robots that experiments designed by a Swiss research team have artificially evolved ways to communicate with one another. The experiments suggest that simulated evolution could be a useful tool for those designing of swarms of robots. The "genomes" of the bots that found food and avoided poison most efficiently were recombined, mimicking biological natural selection.

Cooperative communication evolved when selective success was judged at the group level – when many robots displayed efficient behaviour – or when the genomes of the robots were most similar – like biological relatives. Posted by Jason McManus.

Story Link

Your New Borg Companion

You know how you’ve been wanting a hot android companion programmed to reply, "Yes dear, you're absolutely right” in response to everything you say? Well, here’s some scientific justification for it; a new study has found that robot companionship is as good as the real thing. Well, at least when it comes to dogs. But in theory it may apply to human companionship too, since previous studies have found that a dog companion is better than a human friend in regards to health benefits.

RoboMoth: Scientists Create Robot Driven by Moth's Brain

Researchers at the University of Arizona have created a 6-inch-tall wheeled robot driven by brain impulses of a moth. The creation offers insights into the mechanism of the brain and how it works. As the moth observes activity around it, the signals from its brain are translated and sent to a computer that directs the robot to turn toward wherever the moth is looking.

The moth's vision has evolved over millions of years to accurately guide the insect as it dodges predators or seeks mates. Although the moth brain is the size of a grain of rice, the insect's ability to detect motion is "amazing -- beyond anything we could build," said Charles M. Higgins, UA associate professor of electrical and computer engineering.

   

Scientists Say Sperm is the Ideal Model for Bio-Robots

In many ways, Sperm is the perfect biological delivery system. It generates it’s own energy, can traverse rough terrain and knows how to hone in on its target to deliver the goods. While sperm delivers DNA, Cornell researchers are now borrowing ideas from sperm to provide energy for nanoscale robots aiming to deliver medication from nanosized medical devices.

Geeks & Rock Stars: Gibson Launches World’s First Robot Guitar

This week a self-tuning guitar with robotic technology will launch to the delight of robot enthusiasts and rock stars alike. The guitar will let you jam out some heavy metal chords and then instantly retune for some lighter fare. The robot has a better “ear” than humans, which allows the guitar to instantly self-tune to a standard setting with six tuning presets the musician can switch to by pushing a button as they’re rocking out. The instruments are the first of their kind to have robotic ability. It works by a device in the bridge monitoring the pitch of the guitar. Motorized tuners automatically adjust the pitch of the strings.

"The Blanket Project"- How we Perceive Robot Interaction

The Blanket Project is a "behavioral sculpture" created by Nicholas Stedman, an interactive artist who is currently teaching and studying at the media robotics lab of the University of Buffalo. An ongoing project, it aims to create a fully autonomous robotic blanket that can "navigate through a bedroom or similar environment seeking out people for intimate encounters."

Carnegie Mellon Moon-Robot Whizzes Assembling Team for Google's $30 Million Lunar X-Prize

Researchers in the Robotics Institute of Carnegie Mellon University's School of Computer Science are building a robotic prospector for NASA that can creep over rocky slopes and then anchor itself as a stable platform for drilling deep into extraterrestrial soils.

RoboCup World Finals July '07 -Video

The University of Freiburg's NimbRo won all finals against Japan's Team Osaka of the Humanoid League at RoboCup 2007 held this July in Atlanta.

Freiburg's current research centers on the development of humanoid robots that are able to improve their behavior through learning. This includes the design of robot hardware, as well as algorithms for perception and behavior control. Application areas are RoboCup soccer and intuitive multimodal communication with humans as a museum guide.

Posted by Jason McManus.

Video

Researchers Design Funny ‘Bot' That Can Understand Humor

Finally you’ll have a friend who will laugh at your stupid jokes—never mind that it’s a robot.

University of Cincinnati researchers Julia Taylor and Larry Mazlack recently unveiled a "bot" (actually for now it’s still just a software program) that recognizes jokes. They recently reported the development at the American Association for Artificial Intelligence conference in Vancouver, Canada.

Robots Rising -Scientists are Worried

The Japanese, culturally speaking, tend to love robots. Right now in Japan, you can buy a robot “babysitter” known as the PaPeRo. Because it is capable of face recognition, it “remembers” individuals and can tell you if a child is missing from the group. It can talk, sing and dance. More importantly, it can transmit what it “sees” to absent parents through a cell phone. Parents can talk to their children through the robot’s “voicebox”.

Robots Simulate Darwin's Natural Selection -Daily Discovery

The New Scientist reports that robots that experiments designed by a Swiss research team have artificially evolved ways to communicate with one another. The experiments suggest that simulated evolution could be a useful tool for those designing of swarms of robots. The "genomes" of the bots that found food and avoided poison most efficiently were recombined, mimicking biological natural selection.

Cooperative communication evolved when selective success was judged at the group level – when many robots displayed efficient behaviour – or when the genomes of the robots were most similar – like biological relatives. Posted by Jason McManus.

Story Link