Robot

Jumat, 14 Januari 2011

Contemporary uses

General-purpose autonomous robots

It has been suggested that Open-source robotics#Uses be merged into this article or section. (Discuss)

General-purpose autonomous robots are robots that can perform a variety of functions independently. General-purpose autonomous robots typically can navigate independently in known spaces, handle their own re-charging needs, interface with electronic doors and elevators and perform other basic tasks. Like computers, general-purpose robots can link with networks, software and accessories that increase their usefulness. They may recognize people or objects, talk, provide companionship, monitor environmental quality, respond to alarms, pick up supplies and perform other useful tasks. General-purpose robots may perform a variety of functions simultaneously or they may take on different roles at different times of day. Some such robots try to mimic human beings and may even resemble people in appearance; this type of robot is called a humanoid robot.

A general-purpose robot acts as a guide during the day and a security guard at night

Factory robots

Car production

Over the last three decades automobile factories have become dominated by robots. A typical factory contains hundreds of industrial robots working on fully automated production lines, with one robot for every ten human workers. On an automated production line, a vehicle chassis on a conveyor is welded, glued, painted and finally assembled at a sequence of robot stations.

An intelligent AGV drops-off goods without needing lines or beacons in the workspace

Packaging

Industrial robots are also used extensively for palletizing and packaging of manufactured goods, for example for rapidly taking drink cartons from the end of a conveyor belt and placing them into boxes, or for loading and unloading machining centers.

Electronics

Mass-produced printed circuit boards (PCBs) are almost exclusively manufactured by pick-and-place robots, typically with SCARA manipulators, which remove tiny electronic components from strips or trays, and place them on to PCBs with great accuracy.^[65] Such robots can place hundreds of thousands of components per hour, far out-performing a human in speed, accuracy, and reliability.^[66]

Automated guided vehicles (AGVs)

Mobile robots, following markers or wires in the floor, or using vision^[67] or lasers, are used to transport goods around large facilities, such as warehouses, container ports, or hospitals.^[68]

Early AGV-Style Robots

Limited to tasks that could be accurately defined and had to be performed the same way every time. Very little feedback or intelligence was required, and the robots needed only the most basic exteroceptors (sensors). The limitations of these AGVs are that their paths are not easily altered and they cannot alter their paths if obstacles block them. If one AGV breaks down, it may stop the entire operation.

Interim AGV-Technologies

Developed to deploy triangulation from beacons or bar code grids for scanning on the floor or ceiling. In most factories, triangulation systems tend to require moderate to high maintenance, such as daily cleaning of all beacons or bar codes. Also, if a tall pallet or large vehicle blocks beacons or a bar code is marred, AGVs may become lost. Often such AGVs are designed to be used in human-free environments.

Intelligent AGVs (i-AGVs)

A U.S. Marine Corps technician prepares to use a telerobot to detonate a buried improvised explosive device near Camp Fallujah, Iraq

Such as SpeciMinder,^[69] ADAM,^[70] Tug^[71] and MT 400 with Motivity^[72] are designed for people-friendly workspaces. They navigate by recognizing natural features. 3D scanners or other means of sensing the environment in two or three dimensions help to eliminate cumulative errors in dead-reckoning calculations of the AGV's current position. Some AGVs can create maps of their environment using scanning lasers with simultaneous localization and mapping (SLAM) and use those maps to navigate in real time with other path planning and obstacle avoidance algorithms. They are able to operate in complex environments and perform non-repetitive and non-sequential tasks such as transporting photomasks in a semiconductor lab, specimens in hospitals and goods in warehouses. For dynamic areas, such as warehouses full of pallets, AGVs require additional strategies using three-dimensional sensors such as time-of-flight or stereovision cameras.

Dirty, dangerous, dull or inaccessible tasks

There are many jobs which humans would rather leave to robots. The job may be boring, such as domestic cleaning, or dangerous, such as exploring inside a volcano.^[73] Other jobs are physically inaccessible, such as exploring another planet,^[74] cleaning the inside of a long pipe, or performing laparoscopic surgery.^[75]

Space probes

Almost every unmanned space probe ever launched was a robot. Some were launched in the 1960s with more limited abilities, but their ability to fly and to land (in the case of Luna 9) is an indication of their status as a robot. This includes the Voyager probes and the Galileo probes, as well as other probes.

Telerobots

When a human cannot be present on site to perform a job because it is dangerous, far away, or inaccessible, teleoperated robots, or telerobots are used. Rather than following a predetermined sequence of movements, a telerobot is controlled from a distance by a human operator. The robot may be in another room or another country, or may be on a very different scale to the operator. For instance, a laparoscopic surgery robot allows the surgeon to work inside a human patient on a relatively small scale compared to open surgery, significantly shortening recovery time.^[75] When disabling a bomb, the operator sends a small robot to disable it. Several authors have been using a device called the Longpen to sign books remotely.^[76] Teleoperated robot aircraft, like the Predator Unmanned Aerial Vehicle, are increasingly being used by the military. These pilotless drones can search terrain and fire on targets.^[77]^[78] Hundreds of robots such as iRobot's Packbot and the Foster-Miller TALON are being used in Iraq and Afghanistan by the U.S. military to defuse roadside bombs or Improvised Explosive Devices (IEDs) in an activity known as explosive ordnance disposal (EOD).^[79]

Automated fruit harvesting machines

The Roomba domestic vacuum cleaner robot does a single, menial job

Used to pick fruit on orchards at a cost lower than that of human pickers.

In the home

As prices fall and robots become smarter and more autonomous, simple robots dedicated to a single task work in over a million homes. They are taking on simple but unwanted jobs, such as vacuum cleaning and floor washing, and lawn mowing. Some find these robots to be cute and entertaining, which is one reason that they can sell very well.

Home automation for the elderly and disabled

The population is aging in many countries, especially Japan, meaning that there are increasing numbers of elderly people to care for, but relatively fewer young people to care for them.^[80]^[81] Humans make the best carers, but where they are unavailable, robots are gradually being introduced.^[82]

The Care-Providing robot FRIEND. (Photo: IAT)

The Care-Providing robot FRIEND is a semi-autonomous robot designed to support disabled and elderly people in their daily life activities, like preparing and serving a meal, or reintegration in professional life. FRIEND make it possible for such people, e.g. patients which are paraplegic, have muscle diseases or serious paralysis, e.g. due to strokes, to perform special tasks in daily life self-determined and without help from other people like therapists or nursing staff. The robot FRIEND is the third generation of such robots developed at the Institute of Automation (IAT) of University of Bremen within different research projects.^[83]^[84] Within the last project, AMaRob (AMaRob web page), an interdisciplinary consortium, consisting of technicians, designers as well as therapists and further representatives of various interest groups, influences the development of FRIEND. Besides covering the various technical aspects, also design aspects were included as well as requirements from daily practice given by therapists, in order to develop a care-providing robot that is suitable for daily life activities. The AMaRob project was founded by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF – Bundesministerium für Bildung und Forschung) within the “Leitinnovation Servicerobotik”.

Duct Cleaning

The ANATROLLER ARI-100 is a modular mobile robot used for cleaning hazardous environments

In the hazardous and tight spaces of a building's duct work, many hours can be spent cleaning relatively small areas if a manual brush is used. Robots have been used by many duct cleaners primarily in the industrial and institutional cleaning markets, as they allow the job to be done faster, without exposing workers to the harmful enzymes released by dust mites. For cleaning high-security institutions such as embassies and prisons, duct cleaning robots are vital, as they allow the job to be completed without compromising the security of the institution. Hospitals and other government buildings with hazardous and cancerogenic environments such as nuclear reactors legally must be cleaned using duct cleaning robots, in countries such as Canada, in an effort to improve workplace safety in duct cleaning.

Military robots

Military robots include the SWORDS robot which is currently used in ground-based combat. It can use a variety of weapons and there is some discussion of giving it some degree of autonomy in battleground situations.^[85]^[86]^[87]
Unmanned combat air vehicles (UCAVs), which are an upgraded form of UAVs, can do a wide variety of missions, including combat. UCAVs are being designed such as the Mantis UCAV which would have the ability to fly themselves, to pick their own course and target, and to make most decisions on their own.^[88]
The AAAI has studied this topic in depth^[43] and its president has commissioned a study to look at this issue.^[89]
Some have suggested a need to build "Friendly AI", meaning that the advances which are already occurring with AI should also include an effort to make AI intrinsically friendly and humane.^[90] Several such measures reportedly already exist, with robot-heavy countries such as Japan and South Korea^[39] having begun to pass regulations requiring robots to be equipped with safety systems, and possibly sets of 'laws' akin to Asimov's Three Laws of Robotics.^[91]^[92] An official report was issued in 2009 by the Japanese government's Robot Industry Policy Committee.^[93] Chinese officials and researchers have issued a report suggesting a set of ethical rules, as well as a set of new legal guidelines referred to as "Robot Legal Studies."^[94] Some concern has been expressed over a possible occurrence of robots telling apparent falsehoods.^[95]

Schools

Robotics have also been introduced into the lives of elementary and high school students with the company FIRST (For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology). The organization is the foundation for the FIRST Robotics Competition, FIRST LEGO League, Junior FIRST LEGO League, and FIRST Tech Challenge competitions.

Research robots

Jumat, 22 Oktober 2010

Robot

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Jump to: navigation, search
"Robots" redirects here. For other uses, see robot (disambiguation).
Page semi-protected
Robot
HONDA ASIMO.jpg
ASIMO, a humanoid robot.
Industry Automotive, Medical
Fuel Source Electric
Powered Yes
Self-Propelled Yes
Invented 1206

A robot is a virtual or mechanical artificial agent. In practice, it is usually an electro-mechanical machine which is guided by computer or electronic programming, and is thus able to do tasks on its own. Another common characteristic is that by its appearance or movements, a robot often conveys a sense that it has intent or agency of its own.
Contents
[hide]

* 1 Origins
* 2 Etymology
* 3 History
o 3.1 Early modern developments
o 3.2 Modern developments
* 4 Definitions
o 4.1 Defining characteristics
* 5 Modern robots
o 5.1 Mobile robot
o 5.2 Industrial robots (manipulating)
o 5.3 Service robot
* 6 Social impact
o 6.1 Regional perspectives
o 6.2 Autonomy and ethical questions
o 6.3 Military robots
* 7 Contemporary uses
o 7.1 General-purpose autonomous robots
o 7.2 Factory robots
o 7.3 Dirty, dangerous, dull or inaccessible tasks
o 7.4 Military robots
o 7.5 Schools
o 7.6 Research robots
* 8 Future development
o 8.1 Technological trends
o 8.2 Technological development
* 9 Problems depicted in popular culture
* 10 Timeline
* 11 Literature
* 12 See also
* 13 References
* 14 Further reading
* 15 External links

Origins
Building the robot of Leonardo da Vinci

Since the beginnings of civilisation man has had a fascination for a human-like creation that would assist him. Societies in the early part of the first millennium engaged in slavery and used those slaves to perform the tasks which were either dirty or menial labours. Having slaves freed the enslavers to carry on their society and concentrate on what they perceived as more important tasks such as business and politics. Man had discovered mechanics and the means of creating complex mechanisms which would perform repetitive functions such as waterwheels and pumps. Technological advances were slow but there were more complex machines, generally limited to a very small number, which performed more grandiose functions such as those invented by Hero of Alexandria.

In the first half of the second millennium man began to develop more complex machines as well as rediscovering the Greek engineering methods. Men such as Leonardo Da Vinci in 1495 through to Jacques de Vaucanson in 1739 have made plans for, and built, automata and robots leading to books of designs such as the Japanese Karakuri zui (Illustrated Machinery) in 1796. As mechanical techniques developed through the Industrial age we find more practical applications such as Nikola Tesla in 1898 who designed a radio-controlled torpedo and the Westinghouse Electric Corporation creation Televox in 1926. From here we find a more android development as designers tried to mimic more human-like features including designs such as those of biologist Makoto Nishimura in 1929 and his creation Gakutensoku, which cried and changed its facial expressions, and the more crude Elektro from Westinghouse in 1938.

Electronics now became the driving force of development instead of mechanics with the advent of the first electronic autonomous robots created by William Grey Walter in Bristol, England in 1948. The first digital and programmable robot was invented by George Devol in 1954 and was ultimately called the Unimate. Devol sold the first Unimate to General Motors in 1960 where it was used to lift pieces of hot metal from die casting machines in a plant in Trenton, New Jersey.

Since then we have seen robots finally reach a more true assimilation of all technologies to produce robots such as ASIMO which can walk and move like a human. Robots have replaced slaves in the assistance of performing those repetitive and dangerous tasks which humans prefer not to do or unable to do due to size limitations or even those such as in outer space or at the bottom of the sea where humans could not survive the extreme environments.

Robots come in those two basic forms: Those which are used to make or move things, such as Industrial robots or mobile or servicing robots and those which are used for research into human-like robots such as ASIMO and TOPIO as well as those into more defined and specific roles such as Nano robots and Swarm robots.

Man has developed a fear of the autonomous robot and how it may react in society, such as Shelley's Frankenstein and the EATR, and yet we still use robots in a wide variety of tasks such as vacuuming floors, mowing lawns, cleaning drains, investigating other planets, building cars, entertainment and in warfare.
Etymology
See also: Robots in literature
A scene from Karel Čapek's 1920 play R.U.R. (Rossum's Universal Robots), showing three robots

The word robot was introduced to the public by Czech writer Karel Čapek in his play R.U.R. (Rossum's Universal Robots), published in 1920.[1] The play begins in a factory that makes artificial people called robots, but they are closer to the modern ideas of androids, creatures who can be mistaken for humans. They can plainly think for themselves, though they seem happy to serve. At issue is whether the robots are being exploited and the consequences of their treatment.

Karel Čapek himself did not coin the word. He wrote a short letter in reference to an etymology in the Oxford English Dictionary in which he named his brother, the painter and writer Josef Čapek, as its actual originator.[1]

In an article in the Czech journal Lidové noviny in 1933, he explained that he had originally wanted to call the creatures laboři ("workers", from Latin labor). However, he did not like the word, and sought advice from his brother Josef, who suggested "roboti". The word robota means literally "work", "labor" or "corvée", "serf labor", and figuratively "drudgery" or "hard work" in Czech and many Slavic languages. Traditionally the robota was the work period a serf (corvée) had to give for his lord, typically 6 months of the year. Including Slovak, Ukrainian, Russian and Polish. The origin of the word is the Old Church Slavonic rabota "servitude" ("work" in contemporary Bulgarian and Russian), which in turn comes from the Indo-European root [2] Serfdom was outlawed in 1848 in Bohemia, so at the time Čapek wrote R.U.R., usage of the term robota had broadened to include various types of work, but the obsolete sense of "serfdom" would still have been known.[3][4]

The word robotics, used to describe this field of study, was coined by the science fiction writer Isaac Asimov. Asimov and John W. Campbell created the "Three Laws of Robotics" which are a recurring theme in his books. These have since been used by many others to define laws used in fact and fiction. Introduced in his 1942 short story "Runaround" the Laws state the following:
“

1. A robot may not injure a human being or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm.
2. A robot must obey any orders given to it by human beings, except where such orders would conflict with the First Law.
3. A robot must protect its own existence as long as such protection does not conflict with the First or Second Law.

”
History
Main article: History of robots

Many ancient mythologies include artificial people, such as the mechanical servants built by the Greek god Hephaestus[5] (Vulcan to the Romans), the clay golems of Jewish legend and clay giants of Norse legend, and Galatea, the mythical statue of Pygmalion that came to life. In Greek drama, Deus Ex Machina was contrived as a dramatic device that usually involved lowering a deity by wires into the play to solve a seemingly impossible problem.

The beginning of the robots may be traced to the Greek engineer Ctesibius.[6] In the 4th century BC, the Greek mathematician Archytas of Tarentum postulated a mechanical steam-operated bird he called "The Pigeon". Hero of Alexandria (10–70 AD), a Greek mathematician and inventor, created numerous user-configurable automated devices, and described machines powered by air pressure, steam and water.[7] Su Song built a clock tower in China in 1088 featuring mechanical figurines that chimed the hours.[8]

In the 3rd century BC text of the Lie Zi, there is a curious account on automata involving a much earlier encounter between King Mu of Zhou (Chinese emperor 10th century BC) and a mechanical engineer known as Yan Shi , an 'artificer'. The latter proudly presented the king with a life-size, human-shaped figure of his mechanical 'handiwork' made of leather, wood, and artificial organs.[9]

Al-Jazari (1136–1206), a Muslim inventor during the Artuqid dynasty, designed and constructed a number of automated machines, including kitchen appliances, musical automata powered by water, and programmable automata.[10][11] The robots appeared as four musicians on a boat in a lake, entertaining guests at royal drinking parties. His mechanism had a programmable drum machine with pegs (cams) that bumped into little levers that operated percussion instruments. The drummer could be made to play different rhythms and different drum patterns by moving the pegs to different locations.[10][11]