Building Better Robots

Building Better Robots — page 1 — 1 Humans Have Long Dreamed of Creating Robots Humans have built devices that of these machines could learn new move or act like people and animals tasks Each device was built to do for hundreds of years In the one thing They were not true robots 1700s inventors built automata or The first robot was invented in the mechanical puppets Automata could 1950s Unimate was an industrial move their arms lips or other body robot It was installed at General parts Some could write Some could Motors in 1961 Unimate had a draw One famous automaton could long arm that stacked hot pieces play 12 songs on a flute But none of metal The robot followed instructions programmed into its control system It used the instructions to make decisions about its job And that is perhaps the Many automata were designed to look and act like humans

Building Better Robots — page 2 — 2.3 million Estimated number of industrial robots in the world by the end of 2018 People have been trying to build robots for centuries Unimate the first modern robot was created in the 19505 Robots are programmable machines that can make decisions Interacting with the world is still a challenge for robots Industrial robots Until recently work well for robots tended simple repetitive to do one thing tasks each Some welded cars Others vacuumed floors They were able to do these things as long as they were in fixed settings most basic definition of a robot Robots are programmable machines that can interact with the world around them Sensors feed robots with images sounds and other information about their surroundings Control systems tell robots how to react Many robots can handle objects using devices at the ends of their arms These devices are called end effectors Some robots are mobile There are robots that walk roll on wheels or do both The world is an unpredictable place for robots It's full of obstacles uneven ground and people Today's robot makers are creating machines that are more adaptable Builders hope to make robots that can more easily navigate outside the lab travel where we can't go and even socialize with people

Building Better Robots — page 3 — Da Vinci Provides a Steady Hand The Da Vinci robot's four arms hover over a patient It is performing surgery Each of the robot's arms twitches only slightly as it operates The robot has tiny tools and a 3 D camera at the end of one of its arms The arms have been inserted through small slits in the patient's skin The tools slice and burn away a tumor on her kidney There's very little blood The patient will recover from surgery quickly The Da Vinci robot helps give surgeons steady hands Da Vinci is not doing all of this on its own though A surgeon controls Da Vinci through a console in the corner of the operating room The surgeon can see inside the patient using the robot's 3 D camera system She uses the hand controllers to move the scalpel and laser tools Da Vinci smooths out the doctor's motions including shaky hand movements The robot makes it possible for surgeons to be very precise But the doctor makes the medical decisions Other surgical robots today take the human further out of the picture Humans do not control every movement with some robots

Building Better Robots — page 4 — CyberKnife allows for hyper accurate treatment Traditional treatment affects a much larger area of patients bodies over a longer period of time For example a robot called CyberKnife targets cancer cells with radiation on its own It adjusts if the patient moves Since this robot is so accurate therapy can sometimes be completed in just one week 400,000 SURGICAL SNAKEBOT Carnegie Mellon University is developing a surgical robot shaped like a snake The robot is called Flex It is designed to fit into curving areas of the body such as the throat nose ears or heart valves Flex has a camera and lights at its end Small surgical tools can be threaded through Flex's body A doctor can operate the snakebot using a joystick Approximate number of surgeries done by Da Vinci robots per year Surgeons can operate using robots Da Vinci has four arms with tiny tools and a camera A human operates the robot through a console The robot smooths out the surgeon's motions Other surgical robots today can operate with less human control

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