TECHNOLOGY FOCUS
Robotics and Automation
A roundup of recent advances in engineering technology. In this issue, a look at breakthroughs and commercialization of robots.
ROBOT SURGEON ABOARD SPACE STATION
The International Space Station (ISS) is too small to require its own sick bay, but in January 2024 it received its own surgeon. The Virtual Incision’s MIRA surgical robot system arrived on a cargo capsule, and it is intended to test the limits of remotely operated operations.
The MIRA robot is a self-contained device that is inserted through a small incision in a patient’s abdomen. The system is lightweight, weighing about a kilogram, which the company says is about 1,000 times lighter than conventional robotic surgery systems. The entire system is compact enough that it can be set up in an operating room in a matter of minutes, while designed to function like other minimally invasive tools surgeons have worked with for years.
NASA granted the company permission to experiment with remote surgery aboard ISS. In addition to the robot, the cargo mission included some simulated human flesh. To test the viability of remote surgery aboard a space station, a surgeon at Virtual Incision’s headquarters in Lincoln, Nebr., will teleoperate the robot to perform a simulated surgery.
If successful, such a system could enable surgery on sick or injured astronauts on the moon or in transit to another planet. (The length of time it takes for a signal to reach Mars may make Earth-based remote surgery impractical.) But the company also hopes the demonstration on the space station could spur the adoption of its remote surgical tools in rural hospitals or countries where trained surgeons are in short supply.
SENSOR ENABLES ROBOT TO READ BRAILLE FAST
Humans who read braille, the alphabet made up of raised dots to assist people with vision impairments, glide their fingers over the text with great speed—up to 150 words per minute. Roboticists have been using braille-reading as a test bed for the suppleness and precision of artificial touch sensors, but up to now robots have read the letters slowly, just one at a time.
Recently, an engineering team at the University of Cambridge in England was able to develop a new sensor that enables a robotic finger to fly over braille text, reading at up to 315 words per minute.
The secret is combining touch sensors with a camera. The robot finger glides across the text so fast that the information is “blurred.” The engineers trained a machine-learning algorithm on braille letters that had a blur applied to them to teach it to read decode the blurry data. Once trained, the system was able to detect braille letters with an 87 percent accuracy rate, about the same as human readers, at twice the speed.
The goal isn’t to produce assistive technology, the engineers noted, but to improve robotic sensing of textures and other types of surfaces.
AUTOMATED MANICURE MACHINE UNVEILED
Automation may change the face of nail salons. 10Beauty of Burlington, Mass., has released a toaster-sized machine that provides manicure. The 10, as the machine is marketed, will remove old polish, file and shape nails, apply new polish, and dry the nails in about the same time as a traditional manicure, but without having to wait for a manicurist to be available.
The company says it employs 30 robotics engineers who have been developing the 10 for more than three years.
The manicure robot will be released later in 2024, but the first batch of 1,000 units is already sold out, the company announced in January.
AUTOMATED DOG SITTER IS FIDO’S NEW BEST FRIEND
Dogs are not as needy as children, but they prefer companionship to being left alone all day. Ogmen Robotics unveiled a robot dogsitter at the 2024 CES show in Las Vegas designed to engage pets when then start to get restless.
The Oro robot cruises through the home, checking up on the dog’s well-being. It has an integrated tennis ball launcher for playing fetch and monitors activity to tell if the dog may be sick or hungry. (The robot can activate an automated food dispenser.) Ogmen even claims that the robot can train the dog through tasks that would be exceedingly repetitive for human owners.
The company is taking pre-orders for the robot for $800.
TWO-LEGGED WALKER POWERED BY REAL MUSCLES
Robotic arms and legs lack the speed and fluid motion of animal limbs. A team of researchers from the University of Tokyo in Japan are looking to replicate more natural motions by building a two-legged walking robot that combines muscle tissues with artificial materials. The added muscles enable the walker to walk and pivot much like a human.
The researchers attached lengths of skeletal muscle grown in the lab to an armature of silicon rubber. The whole mechanism is buoyed in water to support its weight.
Each time a leg was jolted with electricity, the muscles contracted and the leg lifted a bit; after the voltage was removed, the leg landed a bit forward from where it started—constituting a step. Alternating legs enabled the legs to shuffle forward, while repeated jolts to the same leg caused the walker to pivot.
The team plans to scale the system up to provide more power, but first they will need to figure out how to provide nutrients and oxygen to the muscles.
GUIDANCE ROBOT FOR VISION-IMPAIRED PEOPLE
For people whose eyesight is impaired, the traditional white cane can be too limited to help navigate today’s complex urban environments. The Glide is a navigational tool available for preorder from Glidance that incorporates artificial intelligence, GPS-enabled maps, and several cameras and sensors to help guide vision-impaired individuals.
The Glide consists of a handle attached to a lightweight two-wheeled pod. The sensors can detect doorways and elevators, and haptic actuators in the handle provide feedback when the robot reaches a preselected destination or approaches an obstacle. The company hopes eventually to integrate the robot with store apps so that the Glide can direct the user to where certain products are located on store shelves.
© 2024 The American Society of Mechanical Engineers. All rights reserved.