Creative New

RepRap is short for Replicating Rapid-prototyper.

RepRap makes its first complete working replicated copy!

Via reprap.org

Look at your computer setup and imagine that you hooked up a 3D printer. Instead of printing on bits of paper this 3D printer makes real, robust, mechanical parts. To give you an idea of how robust, think Lego bricks and you’re in the right area. You could make lots of useful stuff, but interestingly you could also make most of the parts to make another 3D printer. That would be a machine that could copy itself.

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Via virtualworldsnews.com

Researchers at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute,  with support from IBM and other outside parties, are experimenting with  using avatars to test cognitive theory inside of Second Life. It’s not about an NPC simply following a behavior script; instead RPI wants avatars that can “predict and manipulate the behavior of even human players, with whom they will directly interact in the real, physical world [...] by coupling logic-based artificial intelligence and computational cognitive modeling techniques with the processing power of a supercomputer.” Even without AI, crude avatars can already be pretty good at manipulating people, and Gartner is looking ahead to the time when avatars are even more persuasive. RPI is starting small (literally), but looking ahead.

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Nominees for Robot Award 2007

Via pinktentacle.com

This remote-control fire-fighting robot goes where its human comrades cannot, and its relatively compact size makes it ideal for combating blazes in urban environments. An array of 8 high-resolution wide-angle cameras provides a panoramic view of the surroundings, and a multi-channel control system allows 10 fire-fighting robots to be deployed simultaneously. Special nozzles that are 10 times more powerful than those on conventional fire hoses allow the robot to blast flames with 5,000 liters of water per minute.

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10 Cool Robots Hand-Built by High Schoolers

Via popularmechanics.com

The 344 robots at the FIRST Robotics Championship in Atlanta this past weekend all shared similar DNA—each team starts building with a 400-part kit supplied by FIRST, then tests and repairs them in regionals—but it can be difficult to detect the family resemblance. Each bot’s look, appendages and style of movement depend on the goals that each team designs it to achieve. Check out the handful that caught our eye by scrolling down here, then catch up on all the action with our live blog from Bot Town, plus behind-the-scenes videos at PM’s FIRST Central.

Get ready for machines that care for our elderly, clean our houses, and even have sex with us.

Via discovermagazine.com

Perhaps the most interesting reason to design robots in our own image is a new theory of intelligence now catching on among researchers in mechanical engineering and cognitive psychology. Until recently the consensus across many fields, from psychology to artificial intelligence (AI), was that control of the body was centralized in the brain. In the context of robotics, this meant that sensory systems would send data up to a central computer (the robot brain), and the computer would grind away to calculate the right commands. Those commands (much like nerve signals) would then be distributed to motors—acting as the robot’s musculature—and the robot, so directed, would move. This model, first defined decades ago when the very first computers were being built, got its authority from our concept of the brain as the center of thought.

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Design intelligent construction robots

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First MAARS Robot Shipped to U.S. Military

Via foster-miller.com

McLean, VA, June 4, 2008 — QinetiQ North America, a global developer of innovative technology solutions for national defense, today announced that the Foster-Miller subsidiary of its Technology Solutions Group has shipped the first MAARSTM ground robot to the U.S. military under a contract from the Explosive Ordnance Disposal/Low-Intensity Conflict (EOD/LIC) Program within the Combating Terrorism Technical Support Office (CTTSO). MAARS (Modular Advanced Armed Robotic System) is the first fully modular ground robot system capable of providing a measured response including non-lethal, less-lethal and even lethal stand-off capabilities.

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1.What is Future Combat System?

Via fcs.army.mil

Future Combat Systems (FCS) is the United States Army’s principal modernization program. FCS includes 14+1+1 systems consisting of unattended ground sensors (UGS), the Non-Line of Sight - Launch System (NLOS-LS), two classes of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) organic to platoon, and Brigade Combat Team (BCT) echelons; two classes of unmanned ground vehicles, the Small Unmanned Ground Vehicle (SUGV), and Multifunctional Utility/Logistics and Equipment Vehicle (MULE) variants; and the eight manned ground vehicles (14 individual systems), plus the network (14+1), plus the Soldier (14+1+1).

Via wikipedia

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