Becky
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It seems the world has gone a little robot-mad. At the Japanese gadget exhibition, Ceatec - The Combined Exhibition of Advanced Technologies, Murata Manufacturing showed off one of their latest creations: a humanoid robot named 'Murata Boy'. This small robot is capable of cycling, running up to 60cm/s without falling, standing without falling and it can even run backwards. The precision of movements and ability to balance whilst carrying out complex movements is a significant advancement in robotic technologies.
More recently, a 212km race took place in the Nevada desert involving twenty-three driverless vehicles. The winner, a converted Volkswagen Touareg SUV developed by a team in California, took away a $2m prize (£1.1m). The vehicle made use of GPS, cameras, laser range-finders, inertial sensors and seven Pentium M laptops to interpret the information, and completed the course in just under 7 hours at an average speed of 30.7km/h. Such developments are helping to realise the possibility that we may all be driven around by chauffeurs in the future... albeit robotic ones.
It is common knowledge that Japan leads the market for robotics, and consequently EU countries are calling for more input from European businesses. Currently, €50m is spent on research and development of prototypes, but there tends to be a 10-15 year lag between the prototype and production for markets. Indeed, many prototypes never make it into the markets at all. Japan does not seem to have this problem, which is why it succeeds where European businesses fail.
There are many success stories though: a recent example is that of a robotic fish which has been recently unveiled by a team of developers from Essex University. The 'Fish-Bot' currently resides in the London Aquarium, and it has been confusing visitors to the attraction that it is real. The robot is completely autonomous and features a range of sensors, the ability to turn sharply and has very life-like movements.
The majority of us are not lucky enough to have seen these types of robotics up close, but the advancements raise certain questions: not concerning if robots will feature in our daily lives, but when.
Read about the Fish-Bot, Driverless Vehicles and the EU push for robotics
More recently, a 212km race took place in the Nevada desert involving twenty-three driverless vehicles. The winner, a converted Volkswagen Touareg SUV developed by a team in California, took away a $2m prize (£1.1m). The vehicle made use of GPS, cameras, laser range-finders, inertial sensors and seven Pentium M laptops to interpret the information, and completed the course in just under 7 hours at an average speed of 30.7km/h. Such developments are helping to realise the possibility that we may all be driven around by chauffeurs in the future... albeit robotic ones.
It is common knowledge that Japan leads the market for robotics, and consequently EU countries are calling for more input from European businesses. Currently, €50m is spent on research and development of prototypes, but there tends to be a 10-15 year lag between the prototype and production for markets. Indeed, many prototypes never make it into the markets at all. Japan does not seem to have this problem, which is why it succeeds where European businesses fail.
There are many success stories though: a recent example is that of a robotic fish which has been recently unveiled by a team of developers from Essex University. The 'Fish-Bot' currently resides in the London Aquarium, and it has been confusing visitors to the attraction that it is real. The robot is completely autonomous and features a range of sensors, the ability to turn sharply and has very life-like movements.
The majority of us are not lucky enough to have seen these types of robotics up close, but the advancements raise certain questions: not concerning if robots will feature in our daily lives, but when.
Read about the Fish-Bot, Driverless Vehicles and the EU push for robotics
