Science Fiction
Dictionary
A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z
 |
BioTac Robot's Finger More Sensitive Than Yours
The BioTac robotic finger created by USC roboticists is so sensitive it can identify materials by touch - and do it better than you!
(Amazing robotic touch sensitivity)
The robotic finger's design mimics a real human pinky. So it's got a soft, flexible skin with a fingerprint-like surface, which is wrapped over a liquid filling.As the finger slides over a textured surface, the skin vibrates. These telltale shudders are detected by a hydrophone inside the core of the finger, and software then matches those vibrations to materials it has on file.
The robot was trained on 117 common materials, sourced from fabric, stationery and hardware shops. That includes textures like paper, wood and sponge.
When confronted with random materials, the robot would make a number of intelligently-selected exploratory movements (like rubs, wiggles and pokes) before identifying the material. It got the answer right 95 percent of the time.
This development in real-life robotics reminds me of the fictional synthetic flesh used on robots like teddy from Brian Aldiss' 1969 novel Super-Toys Last All Summer Long:
"There have been mechanicals on the market with mini-computers for brains - plastic things without life, super-toys - but we have at last found a way to link computer circuitry with synthetic flesh...""Our serving-man will be, in many senses, a product of the computer. Without computers, we could never have worked through the sophisticated biochemics that go into synthetic flesh."
Update 23-Jun-2015: Sensitive robot fingers were predicted by science fiction writers in 1931. Read this excerpt from The Exile of Time by the great Ray Cummings:
We had gone no more than a hundred feet or so when Migul [the robot] slowed our pace, and began to walk stooped over, with one of its abnormally long arms held close to the ground. The fingers were stiffly outstretched and barely skimmed the floor surface of the tunnel. As we passed through a spot of light I saw that Migul had extended from each of the fingertips an inch-long filament of wire, like finger nails.The Robot murmured abruptly, "Tugh's vibrations are here. I can feel them. He has passed this way recently..."
"He passed here an hour or two ago, perhaps. The vibrations are fading out. But it was Tugh. Well do I know him. Put your hand down. Feel the vibrations?"
"I cannot. My fingers are not that sensitive, Migul."
A faint contempt was in the Robot's tone. "I forgot that you are a man." Then it straightened, and the extended filaments slid back into its fingers.
(Read about the sensitive robot fingers)
End update.
Via Wired UK.
Scroll down for more stories in the same category. (Story submitted 6/20/2012)
Follow this kind of news @Technovelgy.| Email | RSS | Blog It | Stumble | del.icio.us | Digg | Reddit |
Would
you like to contribute a story tip?
It's easy:
Get the URL of the story, and the related sf author, and add
it here.
Comment/Join discussion ( 0 )
Related News Stories - (" Robotics ")
Toy-Like Robot Well-Being Coaches Are The Best
Sumomo will get those office workers into good shape!
Scent-Identifying Robot Uses Machine Learning
'It's picking up diphenyl compounds and tetrahydrocarbons...' - Michael Crichton, 1985.
Robot Imagines Itself (Not The First Time This Has Happened)
'[Robots] have to discover their hands, feet, and other parts of their bodies' - Roger P. Graham, 1949.
Intelligent Trash Sorting By Robots Predicted Long Ago
'Robots pick up the garbage and junk and load it in there...' - Harry Harrison, 1956.
Technovelgy (that's tech-novel-gee!) is devoted to the creative science inventions and ideas of sf authors. Look for the Invention Category that interests you, the Glossary, the Invention Timeline, or see what's New.
Science Fiction
Timeline
1600-1899
1900-1939
1940's 1950's
1960's 1970's
1980's 1990's
2000's 2010's
Current News
Win $250K By Reading Ancient Scrolls Carbonized By Vesuvius
'... it was as if the upper part had been removed, like a cut deck of cards.'
Toy-Like Robot Well-Being Coaches Are The Best
Sumomo will get those office workers into good shape!
AI-Trained Snack App Avatar Goes On Dates For You
'... who let their handbag computers carry all the conversation.'
M-Dwarf Stars May Not Have Habitable Planets
'Thus it came about that the search for a planetiferous sun near a white dwarf star was not unduly prolonged...'
Too Soon To Doom Lunar Farside Observatories
'Earth never shone there, but life was good.'
Amitabh Bachchan Wins Personality Protection
'He led me down the Hall of Portraits to the ego-likeness of the Duke Leto Atreides.'
LIAM F1 UWT Clever Rooftop Windmill
'...a windmill on his roof...'
Scent-Identifying Robot Uses Machine Learning
'It's picking up diphenyl compounds and tetrahydrocarbons...'
Volvo's Autonomous Truck
'They were automatic trucks such as are used for making deliveries...'
Skiing On The Moon - Skiing on Asteroids?
'MacIntyre bent down without a word and picked up the wide skis necessary to negotiate the powdery ash.'
Liberty Lifter X-Plane From DARPA
'...the tremendous speed that the Jupiter was turning up under the thrust of her twenty-four screws whirling on the shafts of twelve powerful motors.'
Robot Performs 3D Bioprinting Inside The Body
'Probably Runciter's body contained a dozen artiforgs...'
Bubloons May Be The Start Of Something Much Bigger
'Spurgle kicked at the letter G... It was a monstrous white thing, ten feet thick, half a city block long...'
Sleeping Pods In Tokyo Railway Stations
'... she was asleep before the lid sealed fully back in place.'
Wist Labs Makes Minority Report Family Videos Come True
Step inside your memory - it's immersive.
Robot Imagines Itself (Not The First Time This Has Happened)
'[Robots] have to discover their hands, feet, and other parts of their bodies'
