Bring 3D printed robots to life with 'Ziro' hand-controlled robotics kit

Benedict for 3Ders.org:  Tech startup ZeroUI, based in San Jose, California, has launched an Indiegogo campaign for Ziro, the “world’s first hand-controlled robotics kit”. The modular kit has been designed to bring 3D printed creations to life, and has already surpassed its $30,000 campaign goal. It would be fair to say that the phenomenon of gesture recognition, throughout the wide variety of consumer electronics to which it has been introduced, has been a mixed success. The huge popularity of the Nintendo Wii showed that—for the right product—users were happy to use their hands and bodies as controllers, but for every Wii, there are a million useless webcam or smartphone functions, lying dormant, unused, and destined for the technology recycle bin.   Full Article:  

Toyota Expands AI, Robotics Research to Third Facility

Kirsten Korosec for Fortune:  Toyota  will expand the footprint of its artificial intelligence and robotics research center by adding a third facility in Ann Arbor, Mich. Gill Pratt, CEO of the Toyota Research Institute, made the announcement on Thursday during his keynote speech at Nvidia’s GPU Technology Conference in San Jose. The Ann Arbor facility will be located near the University of Michigan, where it will fund research in artificial intelligence, robotics, and materials science. Last year, the world’s largest automaker said it would invest $1 billion over the next five years in a research center for artificial intelligence to be based in Palo Alto, Calif. The institute aims to bridge the gap between research in AI and robotics in order to bring this technology to market. The technology is largely being developed for self-driving cars, but the institute is also researching and developing AI products for the home.   Cont'd...

Gestures improve communication - even with robots

Robot avatars programmed to talk with their hands to be understood better

Nervana Delivers New Cloud Platform With Advanced AI Capabilities For On-Demand Deep Learning

10x faster than other AI cloud platforms and optimized to handle complex problems at scale, Nervana Cloud enables enterprises to leverage deep learning to solve their most difficult data problems

Atlas, The Next Generation

From Boston Dynamics:  A new version of Atlas, designed to operate outdoors and inside buildings. It is specialized for mobile manipulation. It is electrically powered and hydraulically actuated. It uses sensors in its body and legs to balance and LIDAR and stereo sensors in its head to avoid obstacles, assess the terrain, help with navigation and manipulate objects. This version of Atlas is about 5' 9" tall (about a head shorter than the DRC Atlas) and weighs 180 lbs.

Quixote Technique Helps Robots Learn Ethical Behavior

The rapid pace of artificial intelligence (AI) has raised fears about whether robots could act unethically or soon choose to harm humans. Some are calling for bans on robotics research; others are calling for more research to understand how AI might be constrained.

Humanoid robots in tomorrow's aircraft manufacturing

From Phys.Org:  Developing humanoid robotic technology to perform difficult tasks in aircraft manufacturing facilities is the goal of a four-year joint research project, which is being conducted by the Joint Robotics Laboratory (CNRS/AIST) and Airbus Group. It will officially be launched on 12 February 2016 at the French Embassy in Tokyo. The introduction of humanoids on aircraft assembly lines will make it possible to relieve human operators of the most laborious and dangerous tasks, thus allowing them to concentrate on higher value-added ones. The primary difficulty for these robots will be to work in a confined environment and move without colliding with the numerous surrounding objects. This is the first issue researchers will have to solve by developing new algorithms for the planning and control of precise movements.   Cont'd...  

WPI Robotics Team to Train Firefighting Humanoid Robot

WPI professor receives nearly $600,000 from the Office of Naval Research to develop motion planning for robot that will fight fires aboard Navy ships

SoftBank's Pepper Robots to Staff Tokyo Cell Phone Store

BY ANGELA MOSCARITOLO for PCMAG:  SoftBank is giving its Pepper robot a new job with some big responsibilities.  The Japanese telecom giant is planning to open a cell phone store in Tokyo this spring staffed primarily by Pepper robots, according to a report from The Japan Times. About five to six Pepper robots will run the store from March 28 through April 3, and be responsible for helping customers and making sales.  "I don't know how this will turn out, but it should be a quite interesting experiment," SoftBank CEO Ken Miyauchi told the newspaper.  The robots will be able to answer questions about different cell phone options, and when someone's ready to buy, they'll even attempt to complete the sale. SoftBank does plan to have humans at the ready to handle tasks Pepper can't yet do — like checking customer IDs when drawing up a new contract.   Cont'd...

Intelligence Squared U.S. Hosts Artificial Intelligence Debate with Lanier, Rothblatt, and more at NYC's 92Y Genius Festival and Online, March 9

Arguing for the motion are Jaron Lanier, named one of the 100 most influential people in the world by Time, and documentary filmmaker James Barrat, whose most recent book is subtitled Artificial Intelligence and the End of the Human Era.

Experts At Davos Say Weaponized Artificial Intelligence Robots Are Dangerous

Matt Dayo for STGist:  This may sound like science fiction, or the plot of a Marvel movie, but AFP is reporting that scientists and arms experts in attendance at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland have issued a dire warning saying that robots with advanced artificial intelligence (or AI robots) could one day join wars and kill many people. A former United Nations Disarmament Affairs representative, Angela Kane, has told a forum in Davos that there are many countries that don’t understand what is involved and the development of such technology is limited to a certain number of rich and advanced nations. Kane and other experts at the debate say rules must be agreed to prevent the development of these killer AI robots.  But at one point during the debate, Kane said “it may be too late.”   Cont'd...

The Center for Advancing Innovation and The Medical Center of the Americas Partner to Launch the SPACE RACE to Advance Promising NASA Inventions

The Center for Advancing Innovation and The Medical Center of the Americas launch the SPACE RACE challenge for student and entrepreneur teams to launch high-tech start-ups and to have the potential to receive significant seed funding.

Bridging the Bio-Electronic Divide

New effort aims for fully implantable devices able to connect with up to one million neurons

Emoshape Announces Production of the Emotions Processing Unit II

THE EMOTION SYNTHESIS ENGINE OF ROBOTS, AI & IoT will be produced with a microchip that enables an emotional response in AI, robots and consumer electronic devices.

Space Bots & Android Waste Collectors: What's Ahead for Robotics

By Elizabeth Palermo for LiveScience:  It was a good year to be a robot. In 2015, researchers in Korea unveiled a robotic exoskeleton that users can control with their minds, a four-legged bot in China set a new world record by walking 83.28 miles (134.03 km) without stopping and 3D-printing robots in Amsterdam started work on a new steel footbridge. But these smart machines are capable of so much more. Researchers around the world are now designing and building bots that will complete more noteworthy tasks in 2016 and beyond. From exploring other planets to fighting fires at sea, here are a few skills that bots could pick up in the new year.   Full Article:  

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