Impressive Robots: Part Two

1. Z-machines from the University of Tokyo:

Z-machines is a robot band consisting of three members, a guitarist, a keyboardist and a drummer. The guiatrist (Mach) holds two guitars and has 78 fingers and uses 12 picks, the drummer (Ashura) has 22 arms and the keyboardist (Cosmo) plays its keyboard by emitting laser beams. These robots are able to maintain perfect synchronisation and Ashura is capable of maintaining the required timing. The robots could play preprogrammed music and could be controlled separately.

sources : http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2486775/Robot-rock-band-Z-Machines-features-guitarist-78-fingers-drummer-21-sticks.html, https://www.wired.com/2014/04/squarepusher-robot-music, https://www.theguardian.com/music/2014/apr/04/squarepusher-z-machines-music-for-robots

2.  BigDog by Boston Dynamics:

BigDog is a rough terrain robot which is pretty smart and was designed to aid soldiers. However, this project was put on hold since the robot was considered to be too noisy for combat. The robot resembles the body of a large dog. Its legs are hinged accordingly and are controlled by a hydraulic actuation system. It is 2.5 feet tall, 3 feet long and weighs 240 lbs. It is capable of walking, running, climbing and laying down along with soldiers and carrying heavy loads, in wet, dry, muddy and uneven lands. It is also capable of throwing objects, maintaining its balance,  moving on lands with slopes of less than 35 degrees, managing its movement and navigating itself.

Sources: http://www.bostondynamics.com/robot_bigdog.html, https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2015/dec/30/us-marines-reject-bigdog-robot-boston-dynamics-ls3-too-noisy

3. ARMin Robot by the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zürich:

This is an exoskeleton robot arm which was made to provide aid to patients with paralyzed arms. It provides therapy to the patient's arm/s by allowing it to be trained repeatedly and intensively, without the supervision of a therapist, which is helpful in rehabilitating the patient's arm/s. This robot consists of a haptic screen which gives the patient a motion to replicate. The robot uses its position, force and torque sensors to provide the patient with only the required amount of help. It also makes the appropriate measurements needed to determine the progress of the patient such as his/her range of movement, velocity, acceleration and torque.

Sources: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/6165447_ARMin_A_robot_for_patient-cooperative_arm_therapy, http://www.sms.hest.ethz.ch/research/current-research-projects/armin-robot.html

4. HAL (Hybrid Assistive Limb) by Tsukuba University and Cybrdyne:

This is an entire exoskeleton suit. It does not require the user to provide any manual input. When the user thinks of moving a limb, the brain creates corresponding electrical signals which are intended to be sent to that part of the body. When these signals are sent, they could be faintly detected on the skin of the specific limb. The HAL detects these signals and moves the corresponding joint of the robot. This makes it possible for certain disabled users to move in the same way as a healthy human being. There are variations of HAL for different applications. One variation is used for therapeutic uses, to provide a user with only the amount of help needed to move the required limb. Another variation provides complete support to patients who are permanently disabled. Another variation allows users to carry out heavy work which is  usually impossible for humans, while the final variation has been specifically designed for disaster recovery purposes.

Sources: https://www.cyberdyne.jp/english/products/HAL

5. Robear by the Japanese research institute, Riken and the Sumimoto Riko Company Ltd. :

This is a caregiver robot bear. It is used to carry people and is used for purposes such as tranferring patients from a bed to a wheelchair or vice versa and for helping people stand. It is especially useful for the elderly and people with disabilities; especially in hospitals, to prevent nurses from getting back aches from having to carry a considerable amount of patients per day. Robear is designed to deal with patients gently, by feeding back the force exerted on its actuators to its control system immediately, which allows the system to control the force exerted by the robot on the patient accordingly. Robear is still a research project as its creators attempt to improve it.

Sources: https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2015/feb/27/robear-bear-shaped-nursing-care-robot, https://www.engadget.com/2015/02/26/robear-japan-caregiver

6. CRAM (Comppressible Robot with Articulated Mechanisms) by Kaushik Jayaram and Robert Full, University of California, Berkeley:

The inspiration for this robot is cockroaches. It is based on a cockroach's ability to move around at high speeds even when its body is contracted to a quarter of its normal size, and its ability to endure a weight of 900 times its body weight. The main idea of CRAM is to make these robots travel in swarms to areas which are too dangerous for humans to access and to gain information of such areas (for example, to look for victims affected by a natural disaster). Due to its cockroach-like structure, CRAM is also capable of squeezing through small spaces, which makes it even more suitable for this application.

Sources: http://www.tweentribune.com/article/tween56/two-words-cockroach-robot