Advancements in robotics are being made at a rapid pace. From machines that carry out tedious domestic tasks to highly specialized devices, we’ve gathered a selection of innovative robots from Japan.
Advancements in robotics are being made at a rapid pace. From machines that carry out tedious domestic tasks to highly specialized devices, we’ve gathered a selection of innovative robots from Japan.
1. Flower Robotics’ Automated Mannequins
Automated mannequins from Flower Robotics have been making an appearance on Japan’s streets since June of 2009. They come in two styles: full body and upper torso. The mannequins have built-in sensors to detect activity around them, turn their heads and change positions. Additionally, they possess an “intelligent system” to record their audience’s reactions and help them optimize their poses according that which ones generate a positive response.
2. Japanese Restaurants’ Ramen Robots
Yoshihira Uchida, a 60-year old shop owner, built a ramen-making robot. The store’s patrons can use computers in the shop to place their orders, specifying ingredients and richness of their soup. While the noodles themselves are cooked by a human, the robot creates a perfectly blended soup as per the customer’s order. At the end of the process, the food is delivered by conveyor belt to the human chef, who adds the noodles and finalizes the toppings.
A video of the robot in action can be found on Reuters’s Youtube channel
3. Baseball Robot
A team of professors at the University of Tokyo’s Graduate School of Information Science and Technology have developed a robot baseball system. It features a pitching robot which can throw balls with 90% accuracy, and a batting robot, which can hit a ball pitched at an estimated 40 kilometers an hour.
Video of the robotic system can be found here
4. Dancer Robot with iPhone 3GS Face
Robochan is a desktop-sized humanoid robot with an iPhone 3GS for a face. She dances, entertains, and has a myriad other functions, thanks to the expressive iPhone face. Watch a video of the Robot in action here.
5. Japanese Robot Suit to Help Disabled
The Hybrid Assistive Limb (HAL) was created by Cyberdyne Corporation to “upgrade existing physical capabilities of the human body”. It weighs 23kg and is comprised of robotic limbs and a backpack containing the suit’s battery and computer system. The HAL suit identifies nerve signals from/to the brain using a sensor attached the wearer’s skin and a signal is sent to the suit’s power unit telling the suit to move in unison with the wearer’s own limbs.
A video presentation of the suit can be seen here.
6. Retail Robot to Provide Interactive Ads
An9-PR, on sale in 2010, is a robot which pitches digital ads in public spaces and high traffic areas. The robot has a built-in touch screen LCD that allows people to quickly access ad information and details regarding the surrounding shopping area.
Find out more here.
7. Robots to do your Chores
Researchers at the University of Tokyo have been demonstrating housekeeping and kitchen robots. Home assistant robots are typically tall and humanoid in appearance. Many of them will have wheels, fingers, and several cameras on their head that recognize objects around them.
More information on these robots can be found here.
8. Tour Guide by Day, Security Guard by Night
A remarkable robot built by Alsok can be found at Fukuoka. This prefecture decided to employ robots, named Guard Robot D1, and locate them in Canal City, a local tourist attraction. During the day, the robot assists tourists offering access to web information and communicates in Japanese, English, Korean, and Chinese. By night, the robot functions like a security guard, capable of alerting authorities in case of emergency.
9. Wakamaru Joins Ancient Festival in Osaka
Engineers at Osaka University initially designed this robot for domestic and office work. The robot was prepared and dressed up to participate in the annual Osaka Tenjin Festival, which takes places every July. Wakamaru was taught to clap and utter the rallying call of the festival. For more information, click here.
10. Robot on the Runway
Yumi Katsura & Kazuhito Yokoi designed and developed HRP-4C, a smoothly functioning robot that makes poses as it walked down the runway. The robot was dressed in a wedding gown on the day of her first public appearance in Osaka earlier this year. More information is available here.
11. Deep Green: A Pool Playing Robot
Equipped with a digital cameras, its hardware photographs and reads the positions of balls on the pool table and takes action after carefully calculating the geometry and statistics to maximize its chances of scoring. According to Wired Magazine, Deep Green is impossible to defeat.
For a video of the robot in action, click here.
12. iPhone Controlled Robot
Ozma2x is an iPhone user who has connected his cellphone to Denso, a speedy robotic arm he uses at work. Through Wi-Fi, the creator has succeeded in controlling the robot in real time using a number of applications on his iPhone.
A video of Denso in action and an elaborate background can be found here.
