Researchers at University of Massachusetts Amherst have created a robotic arm with true learning ability and artificial intelligence. This is truly a breakthrough as part of the problem with robotic helpmates has always been the need to program them for every eventuality that could be encountered. Garbage in; garbage out. Newswise reports.

Newswise — Movies portray robots that can move through the world as easily as humans, and use their hands to operate everything from dishwashers to computers with ease. But in reality, the creation of robots with these skills remains a major challenge. Researchers at the University of Massachusetts Amherst are solving this problem by giving a mobile robotic arm the ability to “see” its environment through a digital camera.

“Mobile robots play an important role in many settings, including planetary exploration and manufacturing,” says Dov Katz, a doctoral student of computer science. “Giving them the ability to manipulate objects will extend their use in medical care and household assistance.”

Results of experiments performed by Katz and Oliver Brock, a professor of computer science, were presented at the Proceedings of the International Electrical and Electronics Engineers Conference on Robotics and Automation May 21 in Pasadena, Calif.

So far, the team has successfully taught their creation, dubbed the UMan, or UMass Mobile Manipulator, to approach unfamiliar objects, such as scissors, garden shears and jointed wooden toys – and learn how they work by pushing on them and observing how they change, the same process used by children as they explore the world.

Dean Kamen is a legend in many industries, but perhaps not many know that much of his inspiration has come from a personal desire to help the physically challenged. Today, word comes from Wired about his latest invention, a mind-controlled robotic prosthetic arm. Check it out.

A monkey has learned to operate a robotic arm to feed itself, using only brain power. Researchers are confident that this technology will help paralyzed and disabled people to create a more autonomous lifestyle in the not-too-distant future. The University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine issued a press release detailing the accomplishment.

PITTSBURGH, May 28 – A monkey has successfully fed itself with fluid, well-controlled movements of a human-like robotic arm by using only signals from its brain, researchers from the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine report in the journal Nature. This significant advance could benefit development of prosthetics for people with spinal cord injuries and those with “locked-in” conditions such as Lou Gehrig’s disease, or amyotrophic lateral sclerosis.

“Our immediate goal is to make a prosthetic device for people with total paralysis,” said Andrew Schwartz, Ph.D., senior author and professor of neurobiology at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine. “Ultimately, our goal is to better understand brain complexity.”

Previously, work has focused on using brain-machine interfaces to control cursor movements displayed on a computer screen. Monkeys in the Schwartz lab have been trained to command cursor movements with the power of their thoughts.

“Now we are beginning to understand how the brain works using brain-machine interface technology,” said Dr. Schwartz. “The more we understand about the brain, the better we’ll be able to treat a wide range of brain disorders, everything from Parkinson’s disease and paralysis to, eventually, Alzheimer’s disease and perhaps even mental illness.”

Using this technology, monkeys in the Schwartz lab are able to move a robotic arm to feed themselves marshmallows and chunks of fruit while their own arms are restrained. Computer software interprets signals picked up by probes the width of a human hair. The probes are inserted into neuronal pathways in the monkey’s motor cortex, a brain region where voluntary movement originates as electrical impulses. The neurons’ collective activity is then evaluated using software programmed with a mathematic algorithm and then sent to the arm, which carries out the actions the monkey intended to perform with its own limb. Movements are fluid and natural, and evidence shows that the monkeys come to regard the robotic device as part of their own bodies.

The primary motor cortex, a part of the brain that controls movement, has thousands of nerve cells, called neurons, which fire together as they contribute to the generation of movement. Because of the massive number of neurons that fire at the same time to control even the simplest of actions, it would be impossible to create probes that capture the firing pattern of each. Pitt researchers developed a special algorithm that uses limited information from about 100 neurons to fill in the missing signals.

“In our research, we’ve demonstrated a higher level of precision, skill and learning,” explained Dr. Schwartz. “The monkey learns by first observing the movement, which activates his brain cells as if he were doing it. It’s a lot like sports training, where trainers have athletes first imagine that they are performing the movements they desire.”

Ok, it has a long way to go, but what a boon this could be!

Fujitsu’s HOAP-3 robot is learning the basics of chess. Now the little fellow is trying his hand at cooking. It can chop, whisk, and grate its way through a simple omelette recipe - check out the video below for the results.

Using a laser pointer to guide a robot to find and retrieve an item it has never seen before sounds like science fiction, but Georgia scientists have found a way to make the ‘impossible’ possible.

ATLANTA— A team of researchers led by Charlie Kemp, director of the Center for Healthcare Robotics in the Health Systems Institute at the Georgia Institute of Technology and Emory University, have found a way to instruct a robot to find and deliver an item it may have never seen before using a more direct manner of communication, a laser pointer.

Pinktentacle translates a cyborg project from Asahi into English for those of us who aren’t blessed with the ability to read Hiragana/Katakana…and what they’ve dug up is astonishing! Japanese researchers have been implanting electrodes for monitoring activities directly into subjects brains. Researchers have already applied with ethics committees to begin robotic testing and expect to have great success. Resistance is futile.

The researchers, who have filed a license application with the Osaka University Hospital ethics board, are working to enlist willing subjects already scheduled to have brain electrodes implanted for the purpose of monitoring epilepsy or other conditions. The procedure, which does not involve puncturing the cortex, places an electrode sheet at the central sulcus, a fold across the center of the brain near the primary motor cortex (which is responsible for planning and executing movements).

To date, the researchers have worked with four test subjects to record brain wave activity generated as they move their arms, elbows and fingers. Working with Advanced Telecommunications Research Institute International (ATR), the researchers have developed a method for analyzing the brain waves to determine the subject’s intended activity to an accuracy of greater than 80%. The next step is to use the data to control robot arms developed by the University of Tokyo’s Department of Precision Engineering.

Microsoft has a small, but growing, business unit dedicated to robotics. Continuing the recent business trend of anticipating the needs of baby boomers, one of the product lines being incubated in the robotics department is an assistive technology called the uBot. The uBot is meant to navigate a home, enabling people with limited mobility to maintain an independent homelife, longer. While it is currently being thought of as an aide for the elderly, clearly it will have further general use amongst any segment of the population suffering from mobility challenges.

The uBot-5 is a two-wheeled, dynamically stable robot with two arms and a rotating trunk.Click to view larger image. Designed to move easily through a human home environment and could someday be used for elder care. Patrick Deegan and Bryan J. Thibodeau, graduate students at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, used Microsoft’s Robotics Studio software to develop uBot-5. Using the attached display screen, someone could see what the robot sees, someday enabling a doctor or relative to check in on a senior citizen who is living with the aid robot. The uBot-5 can pick itself up off the floor, maintain its balance as it moves its two arms and learn from its experiences.

Computerworld has pictures.

You may have noticed that some of our articles are often focusing on ‘toys’ and ‘games’ lately. Particulary the inventive uses for the Wiimote which are being discovered daily. Let me propose something radical: The biggest advances for mobility challenged individuals won’t be coming from the medical community or the research community. They are going to come from computer gamers.

Let me relate a short story to you.

This past New Years, while sitting over a bottle of wine in a lovely French restaurant on 21st St, a friend of mine who happens to be a corporate attorney specializing in securing venture capital told me about a new product in development. She (rather casually I might add) mentioned a headset which could control computers solely by thought. She told me how the developers of this technology were having great trouble actually securing capital because it was a gaming device.

As soon as the words were out of her mouth, I was dumbfounded, excited, and realized I was standing on the brink of the biggest developmental paradox of the future. Right there, over a nice fromage and fruit plate.

‘A gaming device???!’ I thought to myself? No. It’s a revolution. A revolution in a lousy $300 box. I couldn’t understand why the obvious usage, control of environment and restoration of independence for people with limited mobility wasn’t the target market. I was absolutely astonished. Gaming? No funding? These people are sitting on a not only a goldmine of profit but also a gift to society of epic proportion! Why are they saddling themselves with the stigma of ‘computer gaming’? No technology investor will touch anything these days without a very very solid business case — too many people got burned in the bubble. Why not go for medical research money? Why not approach engineering think tanks for assistive device technology?

After thinking about it for about 3.4 seconds, I realized the problem was the medical regulatory committees of the world. The studies and funding and research would be red taped to death and all too often the product wouldn’t ever see the light of day — after all the developers are two guys in a basement. And even with funding, the process can take decades to get something to market. We live, on average 72 years as human beings. Wasting 20 years of that seems a crime. Gaming. It makes sense. Off-book usage of gaming devices…they can’t be regulated. Or stopped.

Since the day the Borg appeared on a Star Trek screen, I think everyone knew that resistance really WAS futile. The melding of technology to the human body has been happening for years in prosthetics and other medical devices; it will only continue to become more sophisticated. The holodeck, and the continued striving for it within the gaming community, is another technology that will eventually happen. Rudimentary versions are already available. I often wonder though, do people really realize what these things will mean to the people who are often overlooked by society?

Regardless of their humble, and often scorned, origins, these things aren’t just for gaming. They aren’t just toys. We will undoubtedly find that they will have a world changing impact on humanity…on the day to day lives of both the enabled and disabled. The pioneers of the technologies that will change the lives of billions are likely to be swigging beer, eating pizza, and thinking about the best way to beat the other guy playing Halo. Perhaps that isn’t so radical (lookin’ at you Mr. Gates and Mr. Jobs), but it is always kind of…shocking to really acknowledge.

Imagine a world where someone who is completely incapable of any movement at all, can simply think about moving letters on a computer screen…or making a TDD telephone call from an enabled iPhone…full two way communication with the world is restored. Imagine a world where a person in a coma can communicate with the outside world, if it’s only doctors able to spy on the thoughts and activities of their brains. Are they hurting? Can they hear us? Is there really anything going on in there at all? Imagine being able to control a small robot to carry books and food and the small luxuries of life, like the remote control from the couch to your bedside, with just a thought.

It truly is inevitable. Hopefully the medical research committees, and the thinktanks at the big boys shops will come around — developing technologies for ‘gaming’ rather than medicine. A simple reclassification could change the lives of millions within a year or two, rather than decades from now. Dr. X, Primary Gaming Device Researcher. Heh.

Who knew it would all come down to a simple question: Would you like to play a game?

New advances in eye-movement recognition technology lead to hands-free surgery. Adaptation and cost-reduction of this technology will lead to significant advances in day to day living challenges for future generations.

James Randerson, science correspondent
The Guardian

British researchers are developing a medical robot which can work out the intentions of a surgeon performing an operation, making surgery easier and more precise.

They hope new software will lead to less invasive operations, for example when conducting a cardiac bypass or tumour removal, allowing patients to recover more quickly.

The improvements have been made to the most advanced robotic surgeon on the market, the Da Vinci. It allows surgeons to sit at a viewing console directing the movement of the robot’s mechanical arms inside the patient’s body. The research team is working on using the surgeon’s eye movements to direct the robot, getting the best out of both human and machine.

“We want to empower the robot and make it more autonomous,” said computer scientist Professor Guang Zhong Yang, of the Hamlyn centre for robotic surgery at Imperial College London.

He said robotic surgeons are currently completely under the control of the surgeon. The robot responds only to the surgeon’s hand movements. “There’s a large amount of information that is not being explored at all. That’s the human part.”

The team has added a device which tracks the surgeon’s eye movements. By working out precisely where each eye is looking, software can build up a 3D map of the area of tissue the surgeon is looking at. “What that does is it uses the surgeon’s brain as a way in to calculating the depth of the tissue,” said the surgeon Lord Darzi, who heads the centre and is a government health minister responsible for improving patient care.

For the rest of the article, click here.