Chembot is just the latest morphing robot to come rolling out of the lab.
By Kristina Grifantini
This week at IROS 09 (Intelligent Robots and
Systems), iRobot and the University of Chicago unveiled a soft,
blobby robot that looks something like an inflating marshmallow.
The new robot, called chembot, changes the shape of its stretchy
polymer skin using a technique called "jamming skin enabled locomotion".
This means that different sections of the robot inflate or deflate separately; controlling this inflation and deflation enables the robot to move. DARPA, which
is funding the project, hopes to use the robot to squeeze into small holes or
under doors, which I'm guessing would be used for sophisticated
surveillance.
See Chembot in action in this movie, (which also includes
a detailed explanation of how the flexible skin works).
Chembot is, however, far from the first shape-shifting robot.
Here are four robots that show similar metamorphic skill.
NASA has also been working its own shape-changing robots for
a while. Instead of a soft, deformable material though, NASA's "TET"
rover, shown in the animation above, changes shape by adjusting trusses that
extend or retract. This would let the robot tumble across terrain and squeeze
through tight crevasses on other planets.
Another
shape-shifter is the University of
Southern California'sSuperBot. This one changes
shape using several modular units which connect together like Legos. This
allows it to adopt different motions, including walking, crawling or rolling.
The Maersk Institute in Denmark has made
self-containing modules that can connect, communicate, and share power to make
a long, winding robot, dubbed ATRON. See ATRON modules learning to work
together and develop modes of locomotion below.
A modified game controller will give military bomb-disposal experts remote touch.
By Kristina Grifantini
iRobot, the company that makes military robots as well as the Roomba
vacuuming bot, announced last Friday that it will receive funding for several endeavors
from the Robotics Technology Consortium (RTC).
One project will see the company develop controllers that give remote
robot operators sensory feedback. The US military currently uses iRobot's
wheeled PackBot in Iraq and Afghanistan for tasks such as bomb disposal,
detecting hazardous materials and carrying equipment.
The company says that adding force sensing to a PackBot arm could give
operators the ability to "feel" the weight of an object or whether it
is hard or soft, via the robot's arms.
iRobot plans to use an enhanced version of the Novint
Falcon haptic controller--a device
designed for computer games that provides a remote sense of touch to the user.
According to the president of iRobot's Government and Industrial
Robots division Joe Dyer:
"[This] would greatly improve warfighters' ability to examine
and manipulate improvised explosive devices (IEDs) and reduce their time on
task, ultimately keeping them safer,"
The RTC funds will also go toward developing better sniper
detection and a sensing robotic head for the UGVs.
Indoor applications would enable the UAVs to respond to emergency
situations that involve large steps, closed doors and rough terrain.
The NSF grant will be used to develop indoor flight control and safety
technology for the UAVs.
Other researchers are developing UAVs and other robots to assist with a rescue or survey an area following a disaster. Robin Murphy, a professor of computer science at Texas A&M University, is leading one effort to use snake-like robots to rescue people trapped beneath rubble. More recently she developed a way to use multiply UAVs to survey an area and locate survivors.
Massachusetts Institute of Technology