MIT’s RF Grasp system uses both a camera and an RF reader to find and grab tagged objects, even when they’re fully blocked from the camera’s view. | Photo Credit: MIT MIT researchers have developed a robot that uses radio waves, which can pass through walls, to sense occluded objects. The robot, called RF-Grasp, combines […]
A Level 4 Motional Chrysler Pacifica Minivan being tested in Las Vegas. | Credit: Motional Motional is now testing Level 4 fully driverless vehicles on public roads in Las Vegas. The Hyundai-Aptiv joint venture said the testing, which began earlier in February, consist of multiple driverless Chrysler Pacifica minivans navigating intersections, unprotected turns, and interactions […]
ActiNav’s high-resolution sensor and CAD matching enable high accuracy picks. | Credit: Universal Robots Founded in 1958, Allied Moulded is a full-service molding operation manufacturing non-metallic electrical boxes and enclosures for residential, commercial and industrial markets. Facing significant challenges due to labor shortages, the Ohio-based company chose Universal Robots’ new ActiNav system to automate an […]
.embed-container { position: relative; padding-bottom: 56.25%; height: 0; overflow: hidden; max-width: 100%; } .embed-container iframe, .embed-container object, .embed-container embed { position: absolute; top: 0; left: 0; width: 100%; height: 100%; } If you missed it, Cooper and 60 Minutes got an exclusive look inside Boston Dynamics’ headquarters in Waltham, Mass. The segment aired [March 29]. […]
The Stretch robot unloading a container. | Photo Credit: Boston Dynamics Using robots to unload freight on receiving docks isn’t a novel idea. A quick YouTube search will return a slew of results. But many of these previous approaches have been stifled by high costs and the inability to handle a growing variety of packages. […]
Collaborative robots (cobots) are designed to operate around humans in a factory environment and to execute tasks in a human-like fashion. Interestingly, assembly tasks that are simple for humans to perform such as gripping, grasping, turning and rotating items require highly sophisticated reinforcement learning (RL) protocols and tactile sensors for cobots to repeatedly successfully perform. […]
The Ingenuity Helicopter sits exposed under the Perseverance Rover on Mars. Perseverance released the debris shield that protected Ingenuity during landing. | Photo Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech NASA is preparing to launch its Ingenuity Helicopter on Mars. Ingenuity is a demo to test the first powered flight on another planet. NASA is targeting no earlier than April […]
Multiple drones move a single box | Image Credit: Georgia Tech Many parcel delivery drones of the future are expected to handle packages weighing five pounds or less, a restriction that would allow small, standardized UAVs to handle a large percentage of the deliveries now done by ground vehicles. But will that relegate heavier packages […]
Many of the world’s great technologies realize their full potential only 50-100 years after invention. Consider the printing press. During the first century after the Gutenberg press was invented, books were printed in impressive quantities but lacked their current level of utility. Why? It was simply because the pages lacked consistent numbers. The post Innovation […]
MIT built a deep learning neural network to aid the design of soft robots, such as these iterations of a robotic elephant. | Photo Credit: MIT There are some tasks traditional robots – the rigid and metallic kind – simply aren’t cut out for. Soft-bodied robots, on the other hand, may be able to interact […]
