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Researchers develop a machine-learning technique that can efficiently learn to control a robot, leading to better performance with fewer data. Researchers from MIT and Stanford University have devised a new machine-learning approach that could be used to control a robot, such as a drone or autonomous vehicle, more effectively and efficiently in dynamic environments where conditions can change rapidly.

Researchers from the Munich Institute of Robotics and Machine Intelligence (MIRMI) at the Technical University of Munich (TUM) have developed an automatic process for making soft sensors. These universal measurement cells can be attached to almost any kind of object. Applications are envisioned especially in robotics and prosthetics.

Cambridge researchers, working in partnership with industry, have helped develop the first 3D-printed piece of concrete infrastructure to be used on a National Highways project. Making the wall digital means it can speak for itself, and we can use our sensors to understand these 3D-printed structures better and accelerate their acceptance in industry Abir Al-Tabbaa The 3D-printed structure - a type of retaining wall known as a headwall - has been installed on the A30 in Cornwall , where it is providing real-time information thanks to Cambridge-designed sensors embedded in its structure.

Swiss engineers are training legged robots for future lunar missions that will search for minerals and raw materials. To ensure that the robots can continue to work even if one of them malfunctions, the researchers are teaching them teamwork. On the Moon, there are raw materials that humanity could one day mine and use.

Researchers at EPFL have developed the first system that enables four-arm laparoscopic surgery by controlling two additional robotic arms via haptic foot interfaces. Roboticists at EPFL have combined multi-limb manipulation with advanced shared control augmentation for an unprecedented advance in the field of laparoscopic surgery.

Researchers from Empa and Imperial College London are developing a heat-resistant drone that can analyze the source of danger at close range in the event of a building or forest fire. This allows firefighters to optimize the strategy of a high-risk operation before entering the danger zone. Where others rush out, they have to go in: Firefighters put themselves in dangerous situations during rescue operations - sometimes right in the midst of a sea of flames.

Jamie Paik and her team of researchers at EPFL's School of Engineering have created an origami-like robot that can change shape, move around and interact with objects and people. By combining inspiration from the digital world of polygon meshing and the biological world of swarm behavior, the Mori3 robot can morph from 2D triangles into almost any 3D object.

Researchers have used Chat-GPT-3 to develop a robotic gripper for harvesting tomatoes, in a first demonstration of the artificial intelligence tool's potential for collaborating with humans on robot design. With their ability to process vast amounts of text data, and to use this information to answer prompts, neural networks known as large language models (LLMs) like Chat-GPT have been making headlines for their potential to change the way we write, learn, and even make art.

Researchers have trained a robotic -chef- to watch and learn from cooking videos, and recreate the dish itself. We wanted to see whether we could train a robot chef to learn in the same incremental way that humans can - by identifying the ingredients and how they go together in the dish Greg Sochacki The researchers, from the University of Cambridge, programmed their robotic chef with a -cookbook- of eight simple salad recipes.

They maintain and repair buildings, observe natural phenomena and transport goods: Drones and robots could play a major role in our lives in the future. With the DroneHub, a kind of aviary is to be created in the NEST research and innovation building on the Empa campus in Dübendorf, where researchers will explore and further develop the interaction of drones, infrastructure and natural habitats together with industrial and academic partners.

It's no problem for animals and insects to jump across grass and sand. Sarah Bergbreiter 's team of researchers at Carnegie Mellon University found they didn't have to look far to enable robots to take the same leap. "I am interested in how we can build these very functional, very small robots that can move around diverse environments," said Bergbreiter, a professor of mechanical engineering.

By Barbara Gigler The smart skin developed by Anna Coclite has many potential applications. With an ERC Proof of Concept Grant, the researcher is exploring its practical applications. Just a few months ago, Anna Maria Coclite and her team from the Institute of Solid State Physics at Graz University of Technology (TU Graz) presented the results of their research as part of Coclite's ERC Starting Grant project "SmartCore" .

April 24, 2023 Unique smart fabric is the first to change both colour and shape in response to two different stimuli A new smart material developed by researchers at the University of Waterloo is activated by both heat and electricity, making it the first ever to respond to two different stimuli. The unique design paves the way for a wide variety of potential applications, including clothing that warms up while you walk from the car to the office in winter and vehicle bumpers that return to their original shape after a collision.

Reading time 4 min. NewIn: Achim Lilienthal In this "NewIn" release, we introduce Achim Lilienthal. He is building robots with a sense of smell that can detect dangerous gases to prevent accidents. In Munich, he aims to establish a high-tech laboratory for the sense of smell in robotics as a focal point for researchers from all over the world working on this topic.

Their task is to monitor the condition of ecosystems, for instance in the forest floor - and crumble to dust when their work is done: bio-gliders modeled on the Java cucumber, which sails its seeds dozens of meters through the air. researchers have developed these sustainable flying sensors from potato starch and wood waste.

The three-fingered robotic gripper can "feel" with great sensitivity along the full length of each finger - not just at the tips. Previous image Inspired by the human finger, MIT researchers have developed a robotic hand that uses high-resolution touch sensing to accurately identify an object after grasping it just one time.

Smart heating saves bees from cold death Up to a third of bee colonies worldwide die over the winter, often due to excessively low temperatures. In cooperation with the Swiss École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL), the team of the Artificial Life Lab at the University of Graz has developed a high-tech honeycomb that can monitor the animals during the cold season and regulate the heat supply in the hive.

Researchers have developed a temperature-modulating robotic system that can be seamlessly integrated into notoriously sensitive honeybee hives, providing both a never-before-seen view of honeybee behavior and a means to influence it. Honeybees are famously finicky when it comes to being studied. Research instruments and conditions and even unfamiliar smells can disrupt a colony's behavior.

A new system enables makers to incorporate sensors into gears and other rotational mechanisms with just one pass in a 3D printer. Close Integrating sensors into rotational mechanisms could make it possible for engineers to build smart hinges that know when a door has been opened, or gears inside a motor that tell a mechanic how fast they are rotating.

New repair techniques enable microscale robots to recover flight performance after suffering severe damage to the artificial muscles that power their wings. Close Bumblebees are clumsy fliers. It is estimated that a foraging bee bumps into a flower about once per second, which damages its wings over time.