7:09 PM
Vishal Kottarathil
IF YOU fancy an extra pair of hands, why not take a
leaf out of Dr Octopus's book? A pair of intelligent arms should make
almost any job a lot easier.
The semi-autonomous arms extend out in
front of the body from the hips and are strapped to a backpack-like
harness that holds the control circuitry. The prototype is the handiwork
of Federico Parietti and Harry Asada of the Massachusetts Institute of
Technology, who suggest that one of the first uses could be to help
factory workers, or those with tricky DIY tasks to perform.
"It's the first time I've seen robot
arms designed to augment human abilities. It's bold and out of keeping
with anything I've ever seen to attach two arms to a human," says Dave
Barrett, a roboticist and mechanical engineer at Olin College in
Needham, Massachusetts.
So how are the arms controlled?
Parietti and Asada designed the limbs to learn and hopefully anticipate
what their wearer wants. The idea is that the algorithms in charge of
the limbs would first be trained to perform specific tasks.
To demonstrate what the prototype can
do, a camera observed a pair of workers helping each other drill into a
loose metal plate. The camera measured the distances between the tools
and work surface, while feedback from sensors on the workers' bodies
tracked their movements. This taught the arms where to grab and how much
force to apply, so it could then assist a lone worker to both hold the
drill and secure the plate.
If you think the idea of free-roaming
robotic arms holding power tools sounds alarming, you aren't alone. "If a
robotic arm can do useful work, it can also hurt you badly," says
Barrett. "Traditionally, people are kept far away from robot arms
because the arms are dangerous. The concept of strapping robotic arms
onto a person is terrifying," he says.
Parietti and Asada have tried to
address some of those safety fears by building the arms from softer
material. Flexible components in the robotic arm, called series elastic
actuators - invented in the 1990s by Gill Pratt and Matt Williamson at
MIT - mean that less damage will be done if the arms do lose control.
Dennis Hong at Virginia Tech in
Blacksburg says that roboticists have spent the last 30 years attempting
to make robots more springy and compliant, so they can work safely
alongside humans. He says he has never come across robotic arms designed
to be worn on the body.
The limbs were described at the
Dynamic Systems and Control Conference in Florida last week. Funded by
Boeing, their first use could be to help workers build aircraft. The
broader goal, say the researchers, is for the limbs and their users to
work seamlessly so that "humans may perceive them as part of their own
bodies"
Orginaly Posted at www.newscientist.com.
