Post subject: Watch These Guys Make a Shark Swim With Their Minds
Posted: Wed Nov 18, 2015 11:04 pm
Joined: Fri Apr 03, 2009 1:35 am Posts: 2692
You could manage robot sharks with your mind in the comfort of your own home thanks to OpenBCI, a Brooklyn company building open source brain computer interfaces.
Post subject: NASA: "MIT to Create Algorithms for Humanoid Robot for
Posted: Fri Nov 20, 2015 8:25 am
Joined: Thu Apr 02, 2009 11:08 am Posts: 1804
NASA: "MIT to Create Algorithms for Humanoid Robot for Space Missions to Mars & Beyond"
NASA announced today that MITs Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory (CSAIL) is one of two university research groups nationwide that will receive a 6-foot, 290-pound humanoid robot to test and develop for future space missions. The MIT team is led by Russ Tedrake of CSAIL to develop algorithms the Valkyrie robot to travel to Mars and beyond.
A group led by CSAIL principal investigator Russ Tedrake will develop algorithms for the robot, known as Valkyrie or R5, as part of NASAs upcoming Space Robotics Dare, which aims to create more dexterous autonomous robots that can help or even take the place of humans extreme space missions. (NASAs dare is divided into a virtual competition using robotic simulations, and a physical competition using the robot.)
Tedrakes team, which was selected from groups that were entered in this years Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) Robotics Dare, will receive as much as $250,000 a year for two years from NASAs Space Technology Mission Directive.
NASA says it is interested in humanoid robots because they can help or even replace astronauts working in extreme space environments. Robots like R5 could be used in future missions either as precursor robots performing mission tasks before humans arrive or as human-assistive robots collaborating with the human crew. While R5 was initially designed to complete disaster-relief maneuvers, its main goal is now to prove itself worthy of even trickier terrain: deep-space exploration.
Advances in robotics, including human-robotic collaboration, are critical to developing the capabilities obligatory for our journey to Mars, said Steve Jurczyk, associate administrator for the Space Technology Mission Directorate (STMD) at NASA Headquarters in Washington, in a NASA press release. We are excited to engage these university research groups to help NASA with this next big step in robotics technology development. Autonomy for autos, robots and more."
As head of CSAILs Robot Locomotion Group, Tedrake has extensive experience with autonomous robots. Over the past three years he led a team of more than 20 researchers to develop algorithms for a government competition to get another 6-foot-tall humanoid robot named Atlas to open doors, turn valves, drill holes, climb stairs, scramble over cinder blocks, and drive a car all in the space of one hour.
Tedrake is also part of CSAILs new $25 million Toyota-funded research center for autonomous cars, specifically focused on advanced decision-making algorithms and systems that allow vehicles to perceive and navigate their surroundings safely, without human input.