Universidad Central de Venezuela Ministerio del Poder Popular para la Educacin Caracas Trabajo nmero 2 de Ingles

Technology And Science Article

Alumno: Manuel Salazar CI:22652221 Daniel Daporta

INTRODUCING KILOBOT, A SWARM ROBOT CHEAP ENOUGH TO ACTUALLY SWARM These tiny Kilobots are not named for their heft. The bots are roughly the size of a quarter and move about on tiny vibrating toothpick legs. Individually, they arent much to look at. But Kilobots arent supposed to be taken in individually--theyre designed to swarm in the thousands, and at $14 a pop they very well may be doing so soon. Developed at the Self Organizing Systems Research Group at Harvard, Kilobots demonstrate some interesting swarm behaviors, even if theyre not necessarily doing anything yet. In this case, the robots can all be programmed to perform a task at the same time in less than 40 seconds via an overhead infrared controller. And once a task is set before them, they can communicate with other Kilobots in their immediate vicinity to carry out their programming. Of course, there are a lot of cool things one could do with a swarm of robots that work together to execute tasks, but first you have to prove that a large number of robots can actually work together, and thats what makes these little bots so unique. Made of cheap components, the cost is next to nothing compared with other, more sophisticated robotic systems, and it takes about five minutes to build a single robot. Harvards current swarm of around 25 Kilobots will soon grow to 1024 individual robots, enough to demonstrate selfhealing and collective transport. From there its just a short leap to swarms of larger (and smaller) robots that can execute a variety of tasks for their human overseers, and just one more short leap to complete enslavement of the human species. MIT DEMONSTRATES SMART CARS THAT PREDICT EACH OTHERS' MOVES TO AVOID COLLISIONS Someday, our cars will all be connected to each other, sharing traffic information, connecting us into road trains, and swapping position info so that collisions become a thing of the un-wired past. But even if new cars came equipped with such networking tools tomorrow--and they wont--it would be decades before every car on the road was wired into the system. So MIT researchers are taking a different tack, modeling human driving behavior to create algorithms that can help computerized cars predict what human drivers are going to do next.

To suss out the patterns in human driving, the team first had to break down the act of operating a moving vehicle into its most basic parts: accelerating and decelerating. Using onboard sensors, the computerized intelligent transportation system (ITS) first determines which state another vehicle is in. From there, there is a finite (but sill large) number of positions on the roadway the vehicle can be after any given duration, be it one second or ten.

Its here that the human behavioral modeling comes into play. The computer assesses other factors (is it an intersection or an onramp?) and other data about where human drivers tend to accelerate or slow down. All this, filtered through an algorithm, gives the ITS a pretty good idea of where a vehicle might be immediately headed. The ITS-equipped vehicle then quickly figures out the areas in which the two vehicles could theoretically collide (this is termed the capture set) decides what it thinks the other car is going to do, acting accordingly to avoid those capture set areas where the risk of collision is remarkably more pronounced. To test the system, the MIT team built two miniature cars--one equipped with ITS, the other controlled by human drivers--and put them on circular, overlapping tracks. They then ran 100 trials, changing up the human driver to compensate for any particular drivers style. The result: collision was avoided 97 times. Vehicles entered the capture set three times, and only one of these instances resulted in collision. Not bad. Of course, all or this has to take place in an instant in the real world, and adding more cars and more variables (pedestrians and cyclists, for instance) compounds the challenges. But the work is important for reasons that go beyond the roadway. If were truly going to learn to live alongside our robots, we dont just need to know what they are going to do next. To some degree, they need to be able to predict our next moves as well. NOW IN PRODUCTION: HUMAN SKIN GROWN IN A ROBOT-CONTROLLED GERMAN SKIN FACTORY Back in 2009, we told you about the skin factory concept at the Fraunhofer Institute for Interfacial Engineering and Biotechnology, where scientists hoped to mass-produce skin at low cost for clinical testing and other uses. Now its come online, with robots squeezing pink solution into pipettes and turning out sheets of human flesh. Der Spiegel took a look inside.

The factory can produce 5,000 penny-sized discs of whitish translucent tissue every month. The designers say it can also come in shades of brown. Each disc will cost about $72, a bit more than expected when the project was in its planning stages two years ago. The German newspaper Der Spiegel took a tour of the facility with its director, Heike Walles; check out their coverage here. Robots and computers control the skin-making process, which takes place in a sterile, climate-controlled setting. The skin broth is closely monitored for any signs of infection and computers guide the lasers and blades that cut swatches of skin. The goal is to pave the way for factory-produced human tissue, complete with blood vessels, that could be used to treat injuries or various medical conditions. As Der Spiegel puts it, Walles believes factories like this one will be the only way to efficiently produce new tissue like bladders, tracheas, cartilage and even human organs. She and others have successfully produced engineered tissue for human transplantation, but the process is hugely expensive and labor-intensive. An automated manufacturing facility could make it cheaper and simpler, she says. For now, the tissue is being used in animal testing and could even be used for products like cosmetics, but it is still a long way from being transplanted. European Union regulations require several stages of animal testing before it could be used in a clinical setting, Der Spiegel reports. DEXTRE, THE SPACE STATION'S ROBOTIC ARM, WILL TRY ITS HAND AT SATELLITE REFUELING Dextre--or the Special Purpose Dexterous Manipulator--is a two-armed robot designed to assist with spacewalk activities on the ISS and, in some cases, replace those extravehicular activities. But thus far, Dextre has been more of a helping hand, performing menial tasks like unpacking cargo. But its now Dextres time to cut its teeth on some real cutting-edge space labor. When Atlantis launches for the ISS next month, it will deliver Dextre a collection of fittings and tools that match up to the fixtures integrated into various satellites and spacecraft. Dextre will use these over the next two years to demonstrate that a robotic system is capable of refueling a satellite in orbit, paving the way for a future robotic mission that will try to refuel an aging NOAA weather satellite.

But this isnt simply pumping gas. The current crop of satellite in orbit--that more than 350 commercial satellites and another 100 government-backed satellites--werent designed with refueling in mind. They pack no systems to aid in robotic navigation or the reflectors or symbol language that computer vision systems often use for robotic vehicular docking. These satellites were basically designed to never be refueled at all, so there are myriad problems spanning robotics, satellite design, navigation systems, and computer vision that have to be solved before a robotic mission can launch. On top of all that, Dextre will also demo rudimentary satellite repair capabilities. Thats a big job, but the payoff is potentially huge. Satellites, of course, are expensive to build and very expensive to haul into orbit. Extending their lives could spell big savings down here on the ground while helping us get the most out of our space investments. As such, NASA hopes to partner with a commercial entity to develop a satellite refueling and servicing business--a collaboration that, if Dextre is successful, could launch a robotic mission to refuel that NOAA satellite and potentially nine other satellites that by that point will be running on fumes.