Teaching Old (Toy) Robots New Tricks -BirdBrain

Connect your toy IR controlled robot toys to your phone or laptop.

The device, developed by Carnegie Mellon University spin-off BirdBrain Technologies, with assistance from the Robotics Institute's CREATE Lab, makes it possible to control a robot, such as WowWee’s popular Robosapien toy, using a computer or Android smartphone.

More details can be found at: http://www.ri.cmu.edu/news_view.html?news_id=211&menu_id=238

Higher Education Academy BotShop Workshop

In a earlier posting the BotShop Workshop at the University of Derby was discussed. A recent more detailed description of the workshop can be found at http://learn.open.ac.uk/mod/oublog/view.php?user=155976&tag=hea . It is an interesting and worthwhile read.

Cynthia Breazeal: Rise of personal robots

Robotics Institute Creates Method for Cross-Domain Image Matching

Taken from: http://www.ri.cmu.edu/news_view.html?news_id=209&menu_id=238

Computers can mimic the human ability to find visually similar images, such as photographs of a fountain in summer and in winter, or a photograph and a painting of the same cathedral, by using a technique that analyzes the uniqueness of images, say researchers at Carnegie Mellon University’s School of Computer Science.

The research team, led by Alexei Efros, associate professor of computer science and robotics, and Abhinav Gupta, assistant research professor of robotics, found that their surprisingly simple technique performed well on a number of visual tasks that normally stump computers, including matching sketches of automobiles with photographs of cars.

The team from the Robotics Institute and Computer Science Department will present its findings on “data-driven uniqueness” on Dec. 14 at SIGGRAPH Asia, a computer graphics and interactive techniques conference in Hong Kong. Their research paper is available online.

From more information go to :http://www.ri.cmu.edu/news_view.html?news_id=209&menu_id=238

slime mold robot

Research lead by Klaus-Peter Zauner of Southampton University in collaboration with researchers at Kobe University in Japan has lead to a robot that is control by slime mold. The work was recently shown within a BBC programme "After Life: The Strange Science of Decay" 

Other articles around this area

Robot moved by a slime mold's fear, New Scientist 13 February 2006

Slime-mould robot glides through a world of change and decay, University of Southampton

A navigation algorithm for swarm robotics inspired by slime mold aggregation

YouTube clip