SCHAFT team tops scores at DARPA Robotics Challenge
(Phys.org) —For those wondering who of 16 competing teams would walk away as top performers in the two-day DARPA Robotics Challenge in Florida over the weekend, the suspense is over. SCHAFT, a Japanese...
View Article4-4-2 becomes 0101: Inside the competitive world of robot football
The whistle has just been blown on one of the most thrilling events on the international sporting calendar. It took place in Brazil and pitted teams from all over the world against each other, each...
View ArticleRunning robots of future may learn from world's best two-legged runners—birds
With an eye toward making better running robots, researchers have made surprising new findings about some of nature's most energy efficient bipeds – running birds.
View ArticleNavy unveils firefighting robot prototype at tech expo (w/ Video)
Scientists unveiled a firefighting robot prototype Feb. 4 at the Naval Future Force Science & Technology EXPO, revealing details about its successful demonstrations last fall aboard the USS...
View ArticleInspired by humans, a robot takes a walk in the grass (w/ Video)
In a rolling, outdoor field, full of lumps, bumps and uneven terrain, researchers at Oregon State University last week successfully field-tested for the first time the locomotion abilities of a...
View ArticleResearchers develop two-legged robot that walks like an animated character
When Walt Disney created Mickey Mouse, he didn't give much thought to how he might bring his character to life in the real world. But robotics now puts that possibility within reach, so Disney...
View ArticleIn the event of robot apocalypse, just wait for a system crash
Do you find yourself worried by the implications of Humans, Channel 4's new drama about the exploits of near-human intelligent robots? Have you ever fretted over the apocalyptic warnings of Stephen...
View Article'Spring-mass' technology heralds the future of walking robots
A study by engineers at Oregon State University suggests that they have achieved the most realistic robotic implementation of human walking dynamics that has ever been done, which may ultimately allow...
View ArticleHow someday robots may run to the rescue—literally
Rescuers in Turkey are working tirelessly to free this young boy, one of the many victims of Sunday's devastating 7.2 magnitude earthquake.
View ArticleReview: Nintendo's 'Star Fox Zero' crashes and burns
How do you solve a problem like Fox McCloud?
View ArticleFree-standing 2-legged robot conquers terrain
An unsupported bipedal robot at the University of Michigan can now walk down steep slopes, through a thin layer of snow, and over uneven and unstable ground.
View ArticleHuman and avian running on uneven ground
Together with colleagues, Dr Roy Müller from the Friedrich Schiller University Jena (Germany) has published a review article in the current issue of the Journal of the Royal Society Interface analyzing...
View ArticleAvatar-style S. Korean manned robot takes first baby steps
A giant South Korean-built manned robot that walks like a human but makes the ground shake under its weight has taken its first baby steps.
View ArticleAustralia's robo-footballers go for gold at world champs
A roar rings out as a small, white robot wins a tussle for the ball and kicks it into the goal.
View ArticleHop, skip, run, leap: Unpredictability boosts survival for bipedal desert...
Sometimes it pays to be unpredictable. A new study shows that when bipedal desert rodents called jerboas are being chased, sudden changes in direction, gait and speed help them elude hungry predators...
View ArticleFuture robots won't resemble humans – we're too inefficient
Humanoid robots are a vanity project: an attempt to create artificial life in our own image – essentially trying to play God. The problem is, we're not very good at it. Ask someone on the street to...
View ArticleCheetah III robot preps for a role as a first responder
If you were to ask someone to name a new technology that emerged from MIT in the 21st century, there's a good chance they would name the robotic cheetah. Developed by the MIT Department of Mechanical...
View ArticleRussia's Kalashnikov branches out from rifles to robots and e-cars
A recent pledge by Kalashnikov to compete with Elon Musk's Tesla with a Russian retro "electric supercar" drew chuckles, but the legendary gun producer has long been trying to branch out into products...
View ArticleThe dynamics and energetics of locomotion depend on the number of propulsive...
Although land animals can move in many different ways, most terrestrial creatures use legs to crawl, scuttle, walk and run about. Leg-propelled animals such as mammals, insects, spiders or centipedes,...
View ArticleModels of dinosaur movement could help us build stronger robots and buildings
From about 245 to 66 million years ago, dinosaurs roamed the Earth. Although well-preserved skeletons give us a good idea of what they looked like, the way their limbs worked remains a bigger mystery....
View ArticleDevelopment of a humanoid robot prototype, HRP-5P, capable of heavy labor
Researchers have developed a humanoid robot prototype, HRP-5P, intended to autonomously perform heavy labor or work in hazardous environments.
View ArticleThe robots being readied to enter nuclear no-go zones
Robust, intelligent robots that react to their surroundings are being developed to work in situations that are too dangerous for humans, such as cleaning up Europe's decades-old radioactive waste or...
View ArticleSome robots walk. Others fly. He built one that can do both.
A bipedal robot walks on the surface of a distant planet. Its sensors scan the environment, sending data back to Earth. It comes to a crumbling hillside, flexes its knees and leaps, thrusters whirring,...
View ArticleRunning may have made dinosaurs' wings flap before they evolved to fly
Before they evolved the ability to fly, two-legged dinosaurs may have begun to flap their wings as a passive effect of running along the ground, according to new research by Jing-Shan Zhao of Tsinghua...
View ArticleHelping robots learn to walk
Fully autonomous robots could transform the way we live, but so far such machines remain beyond the reach of our most advanced technologies. Existing robots are generally limited to performing simple,...
View ArticleWhy your cat is lousy at chess yet way smarter than even the most advanced AI
If you share your home with a dog or a cat, look at it carefully and you will get a good overview of everything we don't know how to do in artificial intelligence.
View ArticleOverlooked arch in the foot is key to its evolution and function
long-overlooked part of the human foot is key to how the foot works, how it evolved, and how we walk and run, a Yale-led team of researchers said.
View ArticleAncient vertebrates had everything they needed to walk underwater millions of...
In 2018, the little skate, a ray-like fish the size of a skillet caused a big wave in evolutionary biology. Researchers from New York University found that little skates, which scuttle along the sea...
View ArticleSingle-molecule experiments reveal force capability of artificial molecular...
National University of Singapore physicists have shown that a single man-made molecular motor can exhibit a force similar to naturally occurring ones that power human muscles. Their results are...
View ArticleHow evolution overshot the optimum bone structure in hopping rodents
Foot bones that are separate in small hopping rodents are fused in their larger cousins, and a team of researchers at the University of Michigan and University of California, San Diego wanted to know why.
View Article
