Have a safe and happy Halloween, and if you see any robots, make sure to destroy them before they steal all your candy. And then steal their candy and send it to me, because candy is awesome and I’m too old to trick or treat in a non-creepy way.

As always, you can catch the other Bots With Stuff from last week over on The Shoebox Blog, including a robot with a puffy shirt and a robot with a hankering for a hunk of cheese.

[ Bots With Stuff ]

As if you don’t have enough distractions while driving, the Personal Robots Group at the MIT Media Lab and MIT’s SENSEable City Lab have teamed up to create AIDA, a robot that lives in your dashboard, is way smarter than you, and has no compunctions about letting you know it:

AIDA is actually watching you while you drive, paying attention to your expressions and even measuring your galvanic skin response through the steering wheel. Based on your driving habits, AIDA will suggest how you can be safer or more efficient. The robot is designed to use expressions to intuitively convey information, something that MIT has a lot of experience with. You know who AIDA reminds me of, though?

AIDA may have her dad’s skinny neck and blocky head, but her face is all mom.

I’ll bet you can’t guess who’s helping sponsor this project… Here’s a hint: it’s not Pixar. Yep, it’s Audi. AKA Volkswagen. AKA the robot car company. AIDA was, in fact, developed in partnership with the Volkswagen Electronics Research Lab out in Palo Alto. It’s really, I dunno, inspiring or something to see a major car company investing so much in future technology. Next time I buy a new car, which is probably going to be never (94 Volvo wagon FTW!), it might very well be a Volkswagen, especially if it can park itself.

[ AIDA ] VIA [ MIT ]

iRobot may have a virtual monopoly on the robot vacuum cleaner market, but unfortunately, there’s not a whole heck of a lot of money there yet. They’ve got their military robots, of course, but it looks like they’re looking to expand their civilian market. No, it’s not a lawn mower division, but rather a healthcare robotics unit, or more specifically, an elder care robotics unit. iRobot is taking a bit of a cue from Asia here, since Korea and Japan have been working (feverishly) on elder care robotics for some time now… Of course, people in Asia (of all generations) generally seem a lot more comfortable with robots and more willing to accept them into their lives, while iRobot as a bit of an uphill struggle with that sort of thing around here.

So what might we expect to see in the way of products from this new division? Here’s my guess: a small mobile platform that integrates the telepresence features of the ConnectR with some kind of simple artificial intelligence that could locate and recognize people, deliver reminders and information based on natural language voice queries, and summon help in an emergency. It would be connected to the internet and could integrate with, say, a doctor’s office or a pharmacy to provide prescription schedules and monitor drug interactions.

Interesting, the only clue that we’ve got so far is not something I would have expected: “an inexpensive, balloon-shaped device that uses a small vacuum pump will let robots gently grab and then lift up various items for older home dwellers. Using a handheld version, Angle demonstrated the device’s ability to mold, blob-like, around odd-shaped objects and then hold them firmly when he used a mini-pump to apply the vacuum.” A grabber and lifter? That implies a fairly complex stereo vision system with object recognition, and probably a significantly more expensive robot. But as Angle points out, institutional care for the elderly costs an average of $10k per month, so a robot that helps people live in their homes longer will have to work hard to outprice its potential market… Especially if it gets insurance subsidies. Hey, can someone who’s read the new health care bill let me know if there’s a robot option in there somewhere?

Incidentally, iRobot already developed a prototype elder care robot, named Cici, which was reportedly on display at a medical devices conference in Boston in December of 2007. Although there were no pictures and iRobot refused to comment, we do know that Cici “stood about the size of a desktop computer and was the shape of a human upper body without arms. The robot has audio features that can be used to check on elderly patients at home and would be linked to a network to alert clinicians elsewhere of a medical problem.”

Press release, after the jump. (Read more…)

We make it to some robot competitions in person here on BotJunkie, most of which are within 5 bucks worth of gas money from our world headquarters on my sofa here in Berkeley California. We also cover a bunch of other competitions around the country, and even internationally, but most of what we hear about comes from Japan or Europe. There are robotics communities all over the world, though, and they meet up at events like the Baltic Robot Sumo Cup, which was held in Klaipeda, Lithuania. Events included Mini-Sumo, 3kg-Sumo, and Roomba-Sumo:

It looks like it was a fairly large and definitely successful event, with the help of some seriously top-tier sponsors like iRobot and ABB, who I kinda wish I’d see on event banners around here more often.

[ Baltic Robot Sumo ]

Industrial and military robots spend most of their time doing industrial and military type things. It’s what they’re for, after all . But if someone gives you a robot, it’s hard to resist playing with it, especially if it’s an expensive (and cute) piece of military hardware like an iRobot SUGV (Small Unmanned Ground Vehicle):

Aww! I want one! If you’re actually in the army, you’ll have better luck getting one of these than I will… All brigade combat teams should have their own robot by 2025.

[ SUGV ] VIA [ RSN ]

Photo from Flickr user steveaux

Remember Clocky? The robotic alarm clock that rolls off and hides from you? It’s clever. But not clever enough for someone like me, who has no trouble falling asleep on the floor after tracking Clocky down and shutting it off. Vadim Ryazanov of Let’s Make Robots has one-upped Clocky with Mr. Wake, a robot alarm clock that sees you coming and then flees thanks to an IR sensor, ensuring that you’ll bash your head against enough pieces of furniture while chasing it to either wake you up or render you unconscious.

Only issue is, Mr. Wake is a beautifully fragile looking robot, and so he might not react well to what I imagine is the most common method of deactivating an alarm clock: a high velocity, well aimed fist.

[ Let's Make Robots ] VIA [ Make ]

Giant mechanical soldiers?! THIS TOTALLY IS SCIENCE FICTION. And furthermore, after you say something like that, you do NOT then present your actual product as a computer generated model.

If REX actually exists (and developer Israel Aerospace Industries insists that it does), it’s a little six wheeled robotic platform able to carry 200 kg on missions for 72 hours without needing to refuel. This is kind of like a miniature version of Lockeed Martin’s MULE, except that it’s about as user friendly as a well-trained dog: Rex will follow the lead soldier of a group automatically and responds to commands like “stop,” “heel,” “fetch,” and “roll over.”

Okay, maybe not that last one, but it does (somehow) fetch.

IAI is optimistic that there is a significant market for a low cost, reliable, and versatile robotic hauler. And I’m sure there is. I’ll tell you what, though: I bet there’s an even more significant market for a GIANT MECHANICAL SOLDIER.

[ IAI REX ] VIA [ CNET ]

If this little guy looks familiar, it’s because he was designed by Tomotaka Takahashi of Robo Garage, who also designed the Tmsuk T-52 Enryu Rescue Dragon. What, you can’t see the family resemblance? Okay, how about with that little record breaking Evolta robot? ROPID is Takahashi’s latest creation, and it shows: using three gyros (one in each leg plus one in the chest) and a bunch of awfully strong servos linked by belts ROPID can jump and even kinda run:

Technically, it’s not running unless ROPID manages to get both feet off the ground at the same time, and from the videos, it doesn’t look like that happens… Even ASIMO (who is several orders of magnitude larger and more complicated) barely manages to do this. So ROPID is really more of a power walker. But that’s okay, we won’t hold it against him, because he’s just so adorable with those glowy eyes and that cute little mouth. ROPID is a good listener too, able to respond to voice commands. What really sells him, though, is the fact that he emotes so well… Maybe that’s why he’ll be starring in a short film, coming soon to a film festival near you. For real.

[ ROPID @ Robo Garage ] VIA [ Robot Watch (Translated) ]

Remember that jumping grasshopper robot from May of last year? It still hasn’t quite figured out how to fly, but it can now make more than one autonomous jump in a row, thanks to a primitive simple but effective self-righting system. It’s the same type of thing we saw on the WeebleCopter: a spherical metal framework with the robot on the bottom, where its weight will cause the whole thing to roll upright:

There are some downsides to this system, including increased bulk and most notably a decrease in jumping height of nearly 25%, but the frame does protect the robot, and if it gets stuck in a tight spot, it can use the frame to bounce off obstacles and get itself pointed in a different direction.

[ Self Deploying Microglider @ EPFL LIS ]

Boston Dynamics has had a page on its website about PETMAN for like a year now, but this is the first we’ve seen of the actual robot. PETMAN is (or will be) an anthropomorphic robot the same size and shape as an average human, designed to test chemical protection suits for the army. PETMAN will be able to move freely on its own; walking, crawling, and “doing a variety of suit-stressing calisthenics during exposure to chemical warfare agents.” Fun! The robot will also be able to control its own temperature and humidity and even sweat inside the suit it’s testing, kinda like this robot just with 100% less creepiness.

PETMAN’s legs and walking intelligence comes from BigDog, which means that PETMAN has no trouble recovering from a shove. We’re looking forward to lots more footage like this… Next up, how about PETMAN on ice?

[ Boston Dynamics PETMAN ]