Another Robotic Vehicle to Help Soldiers

Roland Piquepaille writes "There are many teams of U.S. scientists working on robots able to find improvised explosive devices (IEDs) in Iraq before they can kill American soldiers. Today, let's look at an effort going on at Florida State University (FSU) to build unmanned ground vehicles that could save soldiers' lives. The researchers are creating complex algorithms to control these robots who will have to integrate many different factors such as the type of ground surface or obstacles that might block the vehicle's path. Some of these robots, which also could be used for civilian missions, are currently being tested at FSU. Read more for additional references and pictures of these robots which will have to navigate among dense obstacles."

Comments

where this is leading

[Tablizer]

Hell, just crank up the bandwidth for remote-control vehicles and bots, and outsource the whole damned war. I'm already working on an Abu Graihb torture module.

Re:where this is leading

[Dr. Eggman]

Exactly! What American is going to complain about going to war in some country they never heard if none of our soldiers are dieing? Hippies, that's who!

The economy gets a war boost, the government gets to throw its weight around and the only real cost is the death of a bunch of people that aren't American; everybody wins!

Ok, sarcasm aside I do like the idea of robotizing (it's a real word, look it up!) the army as much as we can. Many a great peace-time inventions started as or were sped up by military investment. Think of what a systematizing of something as complex as the military could do for advancements in public and private robotics, AI, or IT!

Re:where this is leading

[sumdumass]

Part of the war time boost the economy see is directly related to the amount of people displaced in the workforce. CLinton recently demonstrated this when he called reservist to duty for extended periods of time. The efect was taking an already low unemployment rate and making it lower and allowing more people to asume more jobs. Another side effect was more people were making more money because the unemployment was down and business were trying to keep employies or get them in the first place. President bush continued to do this with reservist and we have a pretty strong economy now. Of course the papers won't admit to it unless itis some investor rag who's creditability rest on giving somewhat factual messages.

Robotizing the military will probably continue to have this effect at first. But as we get more efficiant with it and are able to control them from futher away, it will dwindle. We will see less of an argument against going war and probably an increase in war (war like actions). I'm not totaly against that but i fear some leaders might not have sound judgment when considering what will necessitate a war. This just makes the reprecusions and the stakes different. I would say why can't we just have both sides of a ocnflict build robats and let them do battle but that wouldn't work. Imagine having some sort of competition like the olympic to have peace. For some reason (even in video games) Killing a machine doesn't seem as rewarding as taking out the people making the machines. I hope this doesn't turn into the modern day trench warfar with simular results of WW1.

Is it possible to use a targetted EMP burst?

[Rifter13]

Sorry, I really don't know about EMP bursts, beyond that they fry electronics. Would it be possible to create a targetted, or shaped EMP burst, say in front of vehicles that would fry the circuits on the IEDs, and keep the IEDs from going off?

Re:Is it possible to use a targetted EMP burst?

[Anonymous Coward]

If it's possible, I'll buy one so I can fry the sound systems of those fucking low-life assholes with a 50MW subwoofer in their car. We don't have to accept these idiots that can be heard for miles and can't be traced by the police and so can't be arrested (low frequencies being omnidirectionnal...)

Whatever happened to the right to peace and quiet in our homes? Your rights stop where mines start.

Oh, and the new Slashdot looks SUCKS - This isn't a "news for nerds" look, it's a "I'm a futuristic designer" look...

Heh? How does that help?

[layer3switch]

So 2 feet midget robot car driving around trying to stop IEDs with suicidial nutbag driving right into target? Better yet, how does that help everyone trying to not get blown to pieces while shopping for food or trying to go to school or trying to go from point A to point B?

Oh wait, here is an idea. EM bomb. No ignition, No Boom.

Re:better solution..

[Anonymous Coward]

"As far as killing Islamofascists, Iraq is a pretty good strategy."

When will this stupid meme die. Islamofascist is not a good description of militant Islamists; fascism is about more than just a powerful and brutal state. From the Wikipedia entry:

Fascism is a radical authoritarian political philosophy that combines elements of corporatism, totalitarianism, extreme nationalism, militarism, anti-communism and anti-liberalism.

Nationalism is a key component of fascism. The Islamist movement was weaned on fighting the Arab Nationalists. Their ideologies, while both repulsing, are fundamentally incompatable.

The robot i would like to see,

[sumdumass]

The robot i would like to see is a 8 wheeled behemoth with a 4 foot thick armored plate surounding the control area and engine compartment about 6-8 feet wide and maybe 5 foot long that that blasts water jets into the ground directly underneath it to dismantly and land mines it rolls over while doing 50 MPH. Then four robotic armes (2 arms like the booms on a backhoe and 2 arms that function like regular arms capatble of grasping things). EMP generators that only effect maybe a ten foot area and can either disable IED's and road side bombs or set them off. Radio jamming equiptment that can also stop remote detonations. An aray of input sensores that can locate human object and relay thier actions or placment (snypers) and maybe even target them for some other smart weapon to take out. 50 cal snyper riffles and a machine gun, maybe a small 25 or 30 mm auto loading cannon for troop support.

Make this controlable by a couple of nitendo/xbox style controlers with a sighting relay and let it escort every convoy they run in hostile teritory. All the other vehicles need to do is stay back and follow the wet areas. If it does detonate something, it can push it aside, pick it up with the arms and move it or even do a quicky repair to the road to let the other vehilces pass. Give it a UAV for extended sensor information gathering.

The billion dollar cork

[Nuffsaid]

Anything that helps to prevent human losses is welcome. That said, some methods are more efficient than others. Sending sophisticated robots to defuse explosive traps aimed at American soldiers looks way less efficient than keeping those soldiers at home, preventing both the loss of their lives and that of uncounted civilians, the destruction of a country and the wave of terrorism that is spawned by such violence. This kind of "solution" makes me think of a billion-dollar electronic, intelligent cork put into the hole (opened at a price of a billion dollar) into a billion dollar dam that shouldn't have been built in the first place. Weird analogy, I know, but American politics is no less weird.