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Learning Robots

Posted by michael on from the maybe-not-such-a-good-idea dept.

carnun writes "The NewScientist is reporting on a new snakelike robot that uses genetic algorithms to change its motion pattern so that it can still function after sustaining damage." Roland Piquepaille sends in a report about another "learning" robot, named Adam, which is designed to seek out and feed from "flowers".

3 of 125 comments (clear)

  1. Self-repairing robots have been around for a while by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

    A man by the name of Mark Tilden has been building 'unstoppable' robots for years out of regular components. He got his start building cheap, autonomous anti-land mine robots for the military that could have one leg blown off and still crawl around to find another.

    He also built $5 robots that crawled through mazes faster than anything MIT ever put together, pissing off the school's robotics department.

    Google for BEAM Robotics, and check out this interview:
    http://www.exhibitresearch.com/tilden/

  2. the concept's been around for a while by vida · · Score: 4, Informative

    the 'genes' part is new (and very cool) but the 'snakebot' as a concept has been around for a while. NASA announced something like it in OCT-00 nasa and this guys tried to put it in layman terms: here

  3. Re:Worms by drc500free · · Score: 4, Informative

    Ah... there's my account ;-)

    anyway, this is already done with PolyBot:
    http://www2.parc.com/spl/projects/modrobots/polybo t/polybot.html

    each module is autonomous, and it can make legged as well as snake-like configurations. I assume that this worm i similar.