UF electrical and computer engineering master's student Andrew Gray and his pet parrot, Pepper, have been getting plenty of attention worldwide with their beak-driven "Bird Buggy". Gray created the robot for the College of Engineering's Intelligent Machines Design Laboratory course, in which students work all semester to create autonomous robots. When it's time to put the bird away, Bird Buggy is able to dock itself to a base station utilizing a web camera. The students are required to develop their own ideas and find the appropriate parts.
I like referencing Vernor Vinge's A Fire Upon the Deep, specifically his skrode, a machine designed to help a species attain its potential.
Sometimes, aliens need help in alien environments. See the martian perambulator from Between Planets by Robert Heinlein.
Scroll down for more stories in the same category. (Story submitted 4/13/2021)
Mika The Robot-Boss
'the robot-boss was busy at the lip of the new lode instructing and egging the men on to greater speed...' - David C. Cooke, 1939.
Sensitive, Soft Robot Skin
'...tinted material that had all the feel and appearance of human flesh and epidermis.' - Harl Vincent, 1934.
Finger Sensors For Robot Hands
'What strange sensitivity! What an amazing development of science was manifested in every move and act and word of this Robot!' - Ray Cummings, 1931.
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