MIT Researchers Develop 'Real Steel' Robot With Human-Like Reflexes

MojoKid writes: MIT researchers have developed HERMES, an advanced robot that is capable of manipulating objects and environments in nearly the same way as humans do. But this isn't just a project design of a robot only mimicking the actions of its human controller; it can also learn and make precise movements that weren't possible with prior robots. The HERMES robot is controlled by a human operator who wears a remote controller exoskeleton. Movements carried out by the human operator are directly transferred to the humanoid robot with human-like reflexes and haptic feedback in return to the human. This means that HERMES can successfully perform actions such as picking up objects, delicately pouring coffee into a cup and even punching through walls should the need arise. HERMES was developed to help out in emergency situations that would otherwise be too dangerous for human responders.

Comments

no robot

[nospam007]

"... controlled by a human operator who wears a remote controller exoskeleton. "

IOW it's a teleoperated waldo and not a robot.

I know I could read the article, but that would be cheating.

Re:no robot

[Cederic]

I thought it was very watchable. Not a movie great, but the CGI was very well implemented, the story was derivative but well constructed and it was a competent professional film.

Boxing is boring. Robot on Robot action I'd tune in for - shit, I watched Robot Wars, which was largely the same thing.

It's a waldo, not a robot

[Pikoro]

FTA: âoeWeâ(TM)ve designed the robot to be stronger than a person so weâ(TM)d imagine that in the future we want to merge some level of autonomous control along with the humanâ(TM)s intelligence.â

We imagine. The summary has been pulled out of someone's ass. The article says nothing like what the summary does.

Specifically, a dupe from yesterday

[tlambert]

Specifically, a dupe from yesterday.
http://hardware.slashdot.org/s...

Deja Vu

[jklovanc]

I think I have seen this somewhere before. Editors, lol.

Re:The AI crowd exaggerating - as usual

[thinkwaitfast]

I don't know. Maybe launch it into orbit and perform satellite repairs without having to send astronauts and a few days of limited support equipment. Maybe do an upgrade to Hubble instead of crashing it in a few years. Or maybe jwst if something is broken rather than scrap it. Who knows, it they can be made reliable, inexpensive enough, include a copy on every dangerous remote station so if something breaks, have a technician vtelnet into the device to try and fix things remotely before sending expensive and gooey people. Send it to the bottom of the marianas trench and have it live down there. Have three shifts of oceanographers 'living' underwater 24 hours a day and going home at night. Maybe in a generation or two of upgrades later, add in some semi autonomous capability to account for transmission delays and have a small army of of these things walking across the moon or Mars for a fraction of the cost of sending a single person.

Re:This is a dupe.

[PPH]

Of course. The robotic exoskeleton mimics the movements of its human controller. Evidently with a latency of one day.

Get with the program!

[Okian Warrior]

IOW it's a teleoperated waldo and not a robot.

Haven't you heard?

Anything that can skitter across the table is a robot.

Anything with eyes and moveable facial parts is a robot.

Any machine that looks like an arm is a robot.

A robot is anything that looks remotely like it's alive, or a piece of something alive.

Get with the program!

Re:Big Step Forward

[GigaplexNZ]

I'm curious what sort of feedback will be passed back to the operator if the robot falls through an unstable floor.