HAI ROBOTICS Japan and Gaussy to Cooperate in Robot Subscription Services and Exhibit HAIPICK A42N at Logis-Tech Tokyo 2022 | RoboticsTomorrow -…

HAI ROBOTICS Japan and Gaussy Inc. signed a distribution agreement and will exhibit the comprehensive "Roboware" solution at Logis-Tech Tokyo 2022.

HAI ROBOTICS Japan and Gaussy Inc. signed a distribution agreement in August 2022 to promote the HAIPICK ACR series in Japan. The collaboration will adopt HAIPICK A42N as a robot subscription service "Roboware" provided by Gaussy, including warehouse solutions provided by both companies. The two companies are planning to conduct various joint demonstration activities. This time the two companies will exhibit the comprehensive "Roboware" solution at "Logis-Tech Tokyo 2022" and demonstrate the benefits of "HAIPICK A42N."

Joint exhibition solutionsHAIPICK ACR system "HAIPICK A42N" Demo: The ACR robot was independently developed by HAI ROBOTICS. It supports mixing picking of cartons/totes, such as cases of 160cm in size, larger than the standard, and increases the efficiency of picking. It also realizes high-density storage. The HAIPICK ACR system is one of HAI ROBOTICS' main products and has been implemented across a large number of projects. Currently, the company has implemented more than 500 projects worldwide.

Gaussy exhibition booth: The company will exhibit its Warehouse robot subscription service "Roboware." In addition to that, visitors will have the chance to see the Three-dimensional Sorting Robot "Omni Sorter," the Shelf Transfer Robot "Ranger GTP," the Pallet Transport Robot "Ranger IL," the Autonomous Robot "FlexComet/FlexSwift," and two Sharing-type Warehouse Service "WareX.."

About the exhibitionEvent name: Logis-Tech Tokyo 2022

Date: Tuesday, September 13 - Friday, September 16, 2022, 10:00 - 17:00

Venue: Tokyo Big Sight (Tokyo International Exhibition Center) East Halls 1-8

Booth No.: East Hall 5 Booth 5-502 Display Name "Gaussy Co., Ltd."

Click here for pre-registration

About HAI ROBOTICS JAPAN, Inc.Founded in 2016 in Shenzhen, China, HAI ROBOTICS is the pioneer and leader in Autonomous Case-handling Robot (ACR) systems. The company provides efficient, intelligent, flexible and customized warehouse automation solutions through robotics technology and AI algorithms. Since its establishment, it has grown rapidly by incorporating global needs and providing a comprehensive ACR system developed in-house. The company was ranked in the "Unicorn Ranking List" of Hu Run Research Institute in December 2021. HAI ROBOTICS now has more than 500 projects globally and offices in the U.S., Europe, Japan, Southeast Asia, Australia, Hong Kong and Taiwan, serving customers from more than 30 countries and regions.

HAI ROBOTICS JAPAN Co., Ltd., was established in 2021 in Japan as a subsidiary of HAI ROBOTICS Co., Ltd., and promotes automation and DX in the logistics and manufacturing industry through one-stop services from the introduction of ACR systems to operational support. Aiming to do business activities specialized in the Japanese market. HAI ROBOTICS Japan Technical Center was opened in March 2022 to demonstrate and simulate ACR products and solutions.

About Gaussy Inc.With the vision of "Logistics gets you there," Gaussy will provide new options for businesses by building a system that can flexibly respond to changes in warehouse needs and cargo volume. Gaussy offers two services: "Roboware," a subscription-type monthly warehouse robot service that allows anyone to easily operate a warehouse using robots, and "WareX," a sharing warehouse service that allows anyone to easily use vacant warehouse space.

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HAI ROBOTICS Japan and Gaussy to Cooperate in Robot Subscription Services and Exhibit HAIPICK A42N at Logis-Tech Tokyo 2022 | RoboticsTomorrow -...

Hyderabad student bags gold at int’l robotics competition for her physiotherapy robot – EdexLive

Next time, when you are in need of a physiotherapist, you might just find a solution at home without having to go to a hospital. How come, you ask? Here's the invention of 13-year-old Riddhima L Chukkapalli, ARMsio, the physiotherapy robot.

Riddhima, a Class IX student from Oakridge International School, Hyderabad has possibly made the future of the medical industry easier by inventing ARMiso. What's more? It even helped her bag the gold medal in the 2022 International Youth Robotics Competition (IYRC) in the senior robot design category (solo). Thailand, Russia, Malaysia and many other countries participated in it.

Nursing an ambition to become an orthopaedic surgeon, the first thing that came to mind for this young star was to come up with an instrument that can help people.

The young robotics engineers robot ARMsio aids in physiotherapy and rehabilitation services.

After surgeries, patients require physiotherapy sessions by a physiotherapist. The robot that has been developed can aid the physiotherapist. Here's how. The robotic arm must be strapped to the arm of the patient using the velcro straps. The robot moves the elbow and the wrist of the patient at angles ranging from 0 to 90 degrees, at set intervals. The main benefit of ARMsio is that it can be accessed anywhere, anytime and as per the comfort of the patient, says Riddhima.

Being a dancer myself, I know how difficult it is to depend on someone when you get hurt and with ARMsio, one can access their own personal physiotherapist anytime, anywhere, said Riddhima.

I faced a number of issues when I had to take this idea from paper and make it work. I had to do a lot of research and only then was I able to successfully execute this idea, added Riddhima about the challenges she faced during the making of this robot. In addition to being an expert in robotics, this youngster is also interested in Kuchipudi and playing the piano.

The teenage champion Riddhima, who has participated in two IYRCs previously, said, It was really challenging to participate in this competition online. Looking at your competitors and the reaction of the judges while explaining about the robot is what motivated me, but now explaining everything to the camera felt a bit awkward.

Riddhima, showed interest in robotics at a young age, when she was in Class V. Pursuing her interest was made possible due to the exposure provided at her school and the help of her cousins. She then decided to take her interest forward by enrolling at Leap Robots, Research and product development in Hyderabad. My mentors at Leap Robots guided me a lot. They helped me with the structure of this design and I came up with the program," she said. I really wish that this competition was held offline which would be another great exposure for me to meet students and dignitaries from different countries across the world, added Riddhima.

The IYRC is an internationally-scaled robotics competition that has been held for the past few years that encourages youngsters to come up with innovative creations and also provides a variety of programmes.

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Hyderabad student bags gold at int'l robotics competition for her physiotherapy robot - EdexLive

Robotics hiring levels in the mining industry rose in August 2022 – Mining Technology

The proportion of mining industry operations and technologies companies hiring for robotics related positions rose in August 2022 compared with the equivalent month last year, with 26.9% of the companies included in our analysis recruiting for at least one such position.

This latest figure was higher than the 25.3% of companies who were hiring for robotics related jobs a year ago but a decrease compared to the figure of 29.5% in July 2022.

When it came to the rate of all job openings that were linked to robotics, related job postings dropped in August 2022 from July 2022, with 1.3% of newly posted job advertisements being linked to the topic.

This latest figure was an increase compared to the 1% of newly advertised jobs that were linked to robotics in the equivalent month a year ago.

Robotics is one of the topics that GlobalData, from whom our data for this article is taken, have identified as being a key disruptive force facing companies in the coming years. Companies that excel and invest in these areas now are thought to be better prepared for the future business landscape and better equipped to survive unforeseen challenges.

Our analysis of the data shows that mining industry operations and technologies companies are currently hiring for robotics jobs at a rate higher than the average for all companies within GlobalData's job analytics database. The average among all companies stood at 0.6% in August 2022.

GlobalData's job analytics database tracks the daily hiring patterns of thousands of companies across the world, drawing in jobs as they're posted and tagging them with additional layers of data on everything from the seniority of each position to whether a job is linked to wider industry trends.

You can keep track of the latest data from this database as it emerges by visiting our live dashboard here.

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Robotics hiring levels in the mining industry rose in August 2022 - Mining Technology

Big Iron Farm Show demonstration will show the potential of artificial intelligence and robotics in ag – Agweek

WEST FARGO, N.D. If a farmer didn't have to spray his entire field but could instead target weeds at their earliest stage and stop infestations before they start, the cost savings could be immense. Plus, consumers increasingly want less herbicides and other chemical applications applied to food crops, and agriculture continues to strive to be more environmentally friendly.

Dr. Rex Sun, an assistant professor in the department of Agriculture and Biosystems Engineering at North Dakota State University, and his team will have a new technology on display at the 2022 Big Iron Farm Show, Sept. 13-15 in West Fargo, that they think will accomplish those goals a remote control "weedbot" that uses artificial intelligence and robotics to perform site specific weed management.

The daily demonstrations at 1 p.m. will involve bringing real weeds from an NDSU greenhouse and showing how the robot identifies and eliminates them.

"Right now, the farmers are spraying weeds on the whole field, but we don't want to do that," Sun said. "So hopefully by using our precision agriculture technologies like robotics and AI, they can use this robot and identify the early stage and make that solution right on the spot so we don't have to spray the whole field."

The robot is in proof-of-concept stage, and there are improvements left to be made, Sun said, noting that a robot that uses mechanical means to eliminate weeds or systems that look for pests and disease are possible, too.

"This kind of platform, it can customize depending on what kind of applications the farming industry needs," he said.

While the robot is not autonomous, that is another possibility down the road, he said.

John Nowatzki, a retired agricultural machine systems specialist at NDSU who serves on the Big Iron Committee, said another demonstration will be a repeat from last year, with Titan Machinery and Raven Industries showing off their autonomous grain cart technologies . The demonstration will be west of the food court this year, because the space south of the racetrack used in the past is now a corn maze.

Hundreds of vendors also will be on hand at Big Iron, and many are preparing to show off new products or explain popular existing ones.

Nick Chiodo, marketing manager at Crary Industries, said Crary will have their Wind System on display for those who haven't seen it and experts to explain it. The system is an attachment for a soybean header that reduces shatter loss and feeds the combine more evenly through the blowing of high velocity air. Chiodo said the system can increase bushels per acres by as much as 5, with configurations that fit on most brand-name headers.

"Anywhere that grows soybeans, we're probably out there," he said.

They'll also have information and experts on their Revolution Ditcher, for use in cleaning out water ways, ditches or terraces. Chiodo said they'll have the "latest and greatest" on that in their booth.

Crary is planning a Dec. 15 event called Full Pod, which will feature famous farm YouTubers. For the cost of their ticket, attendees at that event will get dinner, a hooded sweatshirt, a grab bag and a chance to win door prizes, as well as opportunities to interact with the YouTubers and other farmers. Chiodo said anyone who has registered for the event can show their ticket at the booth and be entered to win a Grizzly cooler with the Full Pod log.

Big Iron is a must for Crary, Chiodo said. Crary is located close at hand to the fairgrounds.

"It's right across the street from us," he said. "It's our backyard."

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Big Iron Farm Show demonstration will show the potential of artificial intelligence and robotics in ag - Agweek

Researchers are creating underwater robots to study microplastics and map the ocean – WVTF

Researchers at Virginia Tech are developing underwater robots, to be able to map the ocean and study the impacts of microplastics, which are broken down bits of plastic pollution that are filling most of our waters, and could be posing health risks to humans and animals across the world.

Right now the systems that are currently exploring the deep ocean are really large, really expensive, and require an entire ocean ship to support it, said Dan Stilwell, a professor of electrical and computer engineering. Stilwell is director of VTs Center for Marine Autonomy and Robotics program, and is part of the interdisciplinary team working on the project to improve technologies that can study the ocean.

He and two PhD engineering students recently tested out one of their robots as it dove beneath the surface of Claytor Lake in Pulaski County. The robot is bright-yellow and shaped like a missile. It can go more than 1600 feet deep, but on this day, they tested it at a depth of about 9 feet. It was built using 3-D printers at Virginia Tech.

The robot glided, then dipped underneath the water, then practiced doing figure eights along the edge of the lake. Its learning how to orient itselfand the team is testing whether robots can work collaboratively, together, to map huge areas of the ocean.

Were trying to figure out how to reduce the logistics footprint to something really small, Stilwell said. Deploy a lot of vehicles, with very little surface support, and have them work for months at a time.

Several sponsors are interested in the technology, including two alumni who made a $2 million donation to the project. This fall an interdisciplinary group of researchers led by geoscientist Robert Weiss will begin a four-year project to use the robots to collect data on microplastics in Virginia Beach and the Chesapeake Bay.

This report, provided byVirginia Public Radio, was made possible with support from theVirginia Education Association.

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Researchers are creating underwater robots to study microplastics and map the ocean - WVTF

Robots perceived as threats in countries with higher inequality – TRT World

A study finds that workers in countries with greater income and societal inequality are more likely to see disruptive technologies like AI in negative terms.

As we step rapidly towards a machine-powered cognitive revolution, the future of work has increasingly been dominated by headlines like robots are taking your job.

According to a World Economic Forum report, 85 million jobs globally will be displaced by robotics and automation. Conversely, advanced technologies will create 97 million new jobs that require more skills and training.

That disruption is creating a lot of anxiety. For some, greater automation indicates the end of drudgery and mind-numbing tasks. But for others, this rapid development spells a jobless future.

A new study conducted by researchers at the University of Central Florida has found that workers in countries with greater amounts of income and societal inequality were more likely to perceive robots and artificial intelligence (AI) as threats.

The study examined countries in Europe and was published in the journal Technology, Mind and Behavior.

It found that in countries like the Netherlands, Denmark, Sweden and Finland, robots are more likely to be viewed in positive terms than in countries like Greece and Spain, where income inequality is greater.

Data from over 13,000 respondents from 28 EU member states were used, gathered from a 2017 Eurobarometer public opinion survey that examined if there was an association between workers viewing AI and robots as threats and a countrys inequality.

The researchers found a positive association between income inequality through an economic measure called the Gini index, and perceptions that AI and robots pose threats to general job loss.

Building on psychological research on inequality, the studys authors anticipate that people living in more unequal societies will, on average, perceive robots and AI as greater workforce threats.

They highlight that while the objective potential impacts of AI/robots are one thing, the primary focus is what people believe these new technologies are capable of.

None of this is happening in the next year or two, writes tech journalist Sean Captain.

The 5,10, or more years it takes for robots to catch up in both capability and numbers offer time for the current and next generation of workers to learn more advanced skills beyond what machines can do. And those skills could earn them more money, in more interesting jobs. Rather than people losing their employment to machines, the machines may simply fill in for occupations that people no longer want to do anyway.

While the studys focus was on European countries, co-author Mindy Shoss, a professor in UCFs Department of Psychology, says the findings could help better understand the issue in the US as well.

The US always ranks pretty high on inequality and societal inequality, Shoss said. Given that, I would suspect that there probably are, on average, similar negative views of AI and robot technology in the US.

Shoss said that in highly unequal societies there are greater inequalities in income, health and education, as well as more attention given to the social mobility of people, which leads to anxiety and uncertainty about income, status and job security.

Countries that have more people in unequal standing, on average, tend to see these technologies more as a threat, she said.

Shoss added that based on the studys findings, the issue of inequality should be taken more seriously into account when designing and implementing technology, as well as addressing the ways advanced technology could improve jobs or incomes to increase public acceptance.

Source: TRT World

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Robots perceived as threats in countries with higher inequality - TRT World

FTC expands Amazon investigation to include healthcare and robotics buyouts – Input

The Federal Trade Commission has been investigating Amazons Prime business for a while now, but the scope of that investigation is being broadened to include the companys recent acquisitions in healthcare and robotics. Reports from The Wall Street Journal and Politico reveal that both of Amazons recent buyout propositions of Roomba parent company iRobot and of medical provider One Medical are now part of the FTCs ongoing investigation.

While the FTC has kept quite tight-lipped about this investigation in general, its obvious at this point that its a sprawling one. The FTC could potentially sue to block either or both of these acquisitions, slowing or halting them. The watchdog agency has been increasingly proactive in its scrutiny of Big Tech acquisitions under the leadership of Lina Khan.

Leaving no crumbs Amazons summer acquisitions have raised eyebrows from plenty of tech watchdogs, but the FTC has said nothing about the propositions just yet. In July, Amazon announced its plan to buy the entirety of One Medical for $3.9 billion. One Medical is a large-scale healthcare operation that operates 125 clinics across the United States and offers virtual appointments for members. That acquisition which would give Amazon a significant footprint in the healthcare industry writ large was confirmed as under investigation by a securities filing made last week.

Just a few weeks later, Amazon announced that it would be buying iRobot, maker of the popular Roomba smart vacuum system, for $1.7 billion. A formal probe has not yet been opened by the FTC on this front, but sources familiar with the situation told Politico theyd expect that step to be taken sooner rather than later.

Both buyouts would significantly expand Amazons already-massive trove of user data. Both acquisitions could easily be seen as anticompetitive in nature, too, given Amazons penchant for buying competitors rather than actually competing with them.

Amazon wont be happy FTC chairwoman Lina Khan has always been open about her intentions to regulate Amazons sprawling business. As of late, that cause has taken the shape of a deep investigation of Amazons Prime business practices. The FTC seeks to understand whether or not Amazon uses deceptive practices in coercing consumers to sign up for Prime, as well as information on how difficult Amazon makes it for Prime customers to cancel their memberships.

Amazon has made plenty of fuss about this investigation, up to and including filing an official complaint accusing the FTC of harassing executives like former CEO Jeff Bezos. You can bet Amazon will continue to fight the FTC every step of the way as its investigation continues. You dont become a trillion-dollar behemoth without being willing to fight dirty.

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FTC expands Amazon investigation to include healthcare and robotics buyouts - Input

From farm to fork, thanks to … AI and robots? – Marketplace

Much of the western United States dealt with scorching temperatures over the past week, with some parts of California reaching more than 110 degrees Fahrenheit. That state is suffering a multiyear drought, and some residents are allowed to water their gardens and lawns only one day per week.

Texas, Nevada and New Mexico are also experiencing severe droughts, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture. So, farmers have to be especially careful about how they use precious resources like water.

Marketplaces Kimberly Adams spoke with Jill McCluskey, a professor of sustainability at Washington State Universitys School of Economic Sciences, about how smart tech in agriculture can help. The following is an edited transcript of their conversation.

Jill McCluskey: It seems like farmers and producers are almost turning into artificial intelligence engineers. They are using smart crop monitoring and drones, satellites and GPS to become more efficient and reduce costs.

Kimberly Adams: What are some of the issues, or industry concerns, that are really pushing innovation in agriculture technology right now?

McCluskey: I would say the two biggest concerns for agriculture are the availability of labor and the availability of water. Artificial intelligence, robotics and machine learning can help with both of those issues. And so as we have more robotic harvesting, for example, and autonomous farm machinery, we can use less labor. And this also is probably good for the workers, that it reduces the need for them to engage in some of the menial and dangerous work.

Adams: What does a farm robot look like?

McCluskey: It depends on the crop. So for lettuce, for example, it might have wheels on both sides that go over the row of lettuce and can harvest. But for apples, it might have a raising platform that can help harvest the apples. Its just different for each crop, they would be different.

Adams: How much of farm work can be automated at this point?

McCluskey: A lot of it can be automated. If you think about [it], we have self-operated machinery thats connected to sensor data and GPS data. And so you can imagine a combine without a driver harvesting. The more challenging part in terms of harvesting is for the delicate crops that are very labor-intensive. So an example is the raspberry. So if you think about it, a raspberry is very delicate. Its really hard for a robot to pick it without damaging the fruit.

Adams: Is there any technology in development to solve that problem?

McCluskey: Theyre currently working on it. I know for some products, theyre using vacuums to pick the fruit instead of pinching it like a finger would do. They actually vacuum the fruit off the bush.

Adams: There is, of course, this bad drought happening out West this year. And water issues are just an ongoing problem for many parts of this country. How is technology working to address the water shortages many farmers are experiencing?

McCluskey: Sensors that are smart connected and satellites and drones can provide in-ground data of the moisture level. And so the water can be more efficiently applied. In the past, in the West weve often had just irrigation of fields. And so water is not used in an efficient way. And agriculture does use a large proportion of water. And as water gets more scarce, we need to use it optimally.

Adams: How affordable are some of these new technologies for farmers?

McCluskey: Affordability is still an issue. But as we continue to develop cheaper versions of it, I think itll be adopted in a more widespread way. And often, berry farmers and those types of farmers tend to be smaller than, say, a huge wheat farm or a huge soybean farm in the Midwest. So those farmers with huge fields have been able to invest in really expensive farm machinery, but the smaller operators cant. So that is an issue; it needs to get cheaper over time.

Adams: Already, large agricultural companies have a big advantage over the smaller farms. How will the fact that they can invest in these technologies and the smaller farms cant affect that dynamic moving forward?

McCluskey: It definitely puts the large farms at an advantage. And the small farms they probably would be more likely to produce organic crops and other crops that have more value added. And they could specialize in those types of crops in order to survive. But I think it is an issue that as labor gets more expensive, and the robotic technology is also expensive, itll be harder for the small farms to compete.

Adams: Labor shortages in the agricultural sector have been an issue for some time now. And I wonder how that is affecting the urgency of this push to automation.

McCluskey: I think it definitely has affected the urgency. So as labor gets more expensive, we come closer to robotics that are essentially a backstop technology, so then its more expensive. But as the price of labor hits that backstop technology, it might actually be cheaper to invest in robotics for harvest. And at the same time, I think that it becomes a priority for research and development as labor becomes more expensive.

Adams: So with all this new technology, what happens to the workers who remain?

McCluskey: I think in the future, there will be less need for agricultural workers the traditional work that they did of harvesting crops, picking crops. So we would hope that some of those people would be trained to run some of the machinery. They would be trained to do work that is more satisfying and socially sustainable.

Adams: How important is sustainability in the development of all this technology in agriculture?

McCluskey: I think sustainability really drives the use of technology in agriculture. So the use of technology will help producers be more sustainable in their use of water, which is such a difficult problem that were facing as a society, and also be sustainable in terms of workers so that they will need fewer workers to do the really hard and dangerous tasks.

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From farm to fork, thanks to ... AI and robots? - Marketplace

Robotics research shortlisted for education Oscar! – Heriot-Watt University

Published:2 Sep 2022

Research led by Heriot-Watt University has been shortlisted in the prestigiousTimes Higher Education THE Awards 2022, in recognition of its ground-breaking robotics research to support the energy transition.

Offshore wind is a critical component in the drive to net zero. However, inspecting and maintaining these infrastructures is dangerous, expensive and requires support vessels with a high carbon footprint.

Launched in October 2017, with expertise from 13 universities and 30+ industry partners, the Offshore Robotics for Certification of Assets (ORCA) Hub has been leading a revolution in offshore energy inspection, collaborating on an unprecedented scale to match research directly to industry needs.

The work, which is now being progressed as part of the National Robotarium, a partnership between Heriot-Watt University and the University of Edinburgh, has demonstrated how Robotics and Autonomous Systems can safely inspect, maintain, and repair offshore infrastructure, guided by people on ships or onshore. Examples include what is believed to be the first autonomous foundation inspection at an offshore wind farm, developing 3D maps to show repair needs.

Widely known as the Oscars of higher education' the Times Higher Education (THE) Awards attracted more than 550 entries this year. The ORCA Hub is shortlisted for STEM: Research Project of the Year.

Professor Yvan Petillot, director of the ORCA Hub and joint academic lead of the National Robotarium, said: We are enormously proud to be shortlisted for this prestigious award and it is a testament to the incredible work of all our researchers, our multiple collaborators and industry partners who have supported our work over the last five years. The ORCA Hub's work has prompted a revolution in offshore energy inspection, raising the profile of Robotics and Autonomous Systems while accelerating government and industry net zero ambitions.

Together with our collaborators, we have equipped drones with contact capabilities to monitor turbine surfaces, reducing risky human-led operations. We've showcased our work to more than 15,000 people in person through events and we've highlighted our research to more than 200 million people globally through media coverage. We're continuing our work as part of the National Robotarium to address some of industry's biggest challenges. Our far-reaching work has international impact and the ability to meet major societal needs as the race to net zero gathers pace. We'd urge those with an interest in collaborating to get in touch with us.

THEeditor John Gill said:This is the 18thyear that the THE Awards will celebrate the best that UK higher education has to offer, across 20 categories covering all aspects of university activity. Once again, the shortlists reflect universities doing extraordinary things in extraordinary times, during the 2020-21 academic year, when the pandemic continued to force higher education and all who work in it to respond to an unprecedented challenge.

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Robotics research shortlisted for education Oscar! - Heriot-Watt University

Southwestern Pa. to put $62.7M toward areas distinctive strength in robotics | Today in Pa. – PennLive

You can listen to the latest episode of Today in Pa at this link, or on any of your favorite apps including Alexa, Apple, Spotify, and Stitcher. Episodes are available every weekday on PennLive. Feel free to subscribe, follow or rate Today in Pa. as you see fit!

A burglars three-year crime spree may have come to an end. The southwestern part of the state will use $62.7 million in funds to expand the regions distinctive strength in robotics. Splendid news, teachersyou can get free coffee for the whole of September courtesy of Wawa. And a chipmunk named George goes viral.

Those are the stories we cover in the latest episode of Today in Pa., a daily weekday podcast from PennLive.com and hosted by Claudia Dimuro. Today in Pa. is dedicated to sharing the most important and interesting stories pertaining to Pennsylvania that lets you know, indeed, whats happening today in Pa.

Todays episode refers to the following articles:

If you enjoy Today in Pa., consider leaving us a review on Apple Podcasts or on Amazon. Reviews help others find the show and, besides, wed like to know what you think about the program, too.

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Southwestern Pa. to put $62.7M toward areas distinctive strength in robotics | Today in Pa. - PennLive

Career Wise: Success is Automated as a Robotics Professional, Here’s How to Land the High Tech Jobs – News18

As the board exam results are being announced, students are ready to transition from schools to colleges.The firststep in this transition is to make a career choice. To help you in selecting the right professional path for you, every week we explore new professional avenues for you. Bring a unique career and a roadmap that can help you take up a job in that profession. If you have any other queries or have a course or career you want us to explore, write to us on Twitter at @News18dotcom.

During the first two industrial revolutions, mechanical engineering got consolidated as a profession for designing, building, managing machinery, etc. Its central body of knowledge evolved to include knowledge areas of materials, mechanics, thermodynamics, fluid mechanics, machine design, and manufacturing. Thus, it is the predecessor of all other forms of engineering and will continue to be enriched by them to conceive, design, build, and manage more sophisticated machinery with enhanced complexity, flexibility, connectivity, automation, and intelligence.

Various technologies of the fourth industrial revolution are now making the body of knowledge and professional practice of mechanical engineering much more interdisciplinary as compared to the earlier industrial revolutions. Some of these key technologies are AI and ML, IoT, Robots and Cobots, Big Data, 5G, Augmented and Virtual Reality, and 3D and 4D printing.

Machines with automation mechanisms have existed since pre-historical times. Traps for hunting animals were probably the first man-made machines that operated automatically as the animal passed through. Today, automation engineers apply diverse technologies to streamline, improve, and automate manufacturing, electricity generation, warehouse distribution, mining, and many other processes to reduce the need for human intervention and maximise efficiency.

As per the 2020 report on the Future of jobs by the World Economic Forum, robotics and industrial automation are likely to be adopted by more than 60per cent of companies. A McKinsey Global Survey of October 2021, showed that 70per cent of global respondents say that their companies are at least piloting automation in one or more business units or functions.

Students who want to pursue a career in automation and robotic engineering in India can choose from a variety of study options, including either broad UG studies like mechanical engineering, electronics engineering, or computer science and engineering, or specialised UG studies like mechatronics engineering, automation and robotics engineering, etc.

Many universities are also offering PG programmes like MTech. in robotics, MTech in automation and robotics, MTech in intelligent systems and robotics, MTech in mechatronics, PhD in robotics, etc. The choice between a broad or a specialised programmemust be made by carefully examining the curriculum, courses, lab facilities, and faculty quality. In many cases, a broad programme with many courses relevant to automation and robotics can be better than some specialised programs.

Engineering students interested in this field should acquire adequate skills while they are in college to build a bright career for themselves. In order to serve in the area, students should basically develop the ability to conceive, design, implement, and manage automation systems by using principles of machine design, process control, mechatronics, cyber-physical systems, robotics, artificial intelligence, and state of the art components and tools.

It will be crucial to learn and have an interest in machine design, programming, embedded systems, IoT, mathematics, etc. Furthermore, every automation and robotics engineer must possess some fundamental competencies systems thinking, computational thinking, complex problem solving using an inter-disciplinary approach, lifelong learning, communication, and the ability to work in a multi-disciplinary team.

Candidates with a relevant educational background and project experience can work in the fields of system integration, application development, quality control, manufacturing, and research and development for robots and other mechatronics systems. They can work as a robotics programmer, robotics design engineer, robotics systems engineer, robot test engineer, or automated product design engineer.

Globally, robotics engineering is regarded as a high-end job. Those with professional expertise in robotics engineering are in for a world of several work options. A robotic engineer can find work in manufacturing facilities, the automation industry, machinery/automobile manufacturers, research facilities, etc.

A large number of well-paying automation and robotics jobs are set to be in demand in India as well as overseas in the coming years. For example, as per Indeed, the current average annual salary for a robotics engineer is around 90,000 USD, comparable to the average annual salary of a software engineer in the United States.

According to several estimates, a fresher robotics engineers average salary in India is around Rs 5 lakhs.

Written by Dr Sanjay Goel, Director of Institute of Engineering and Technology, JK Lakshmipat University

Explore other career options with us:Career in Sound Designing, Sound Engineering|Sustainability Professional|Yoga & Naturopathy|Software Testing|Medical Coding|Cloud Developer & Cloud Architect|3D Technology| Garment Technologist |AI & Robotics |

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Career Wise: Success is Automated as a Robotics Professional, Here's How to Land the High Tech Jobs - News18

Robot Takes Loan! Robotics Company Brings ‘Sayabot’ Dressed in Saree To Receive Loan Sanction Letter From – LatestLY

Kochi's Federal Bank recently gave a tail wind to robotics innovation company,ASIMOV Robotics Pvt Ltd. The firm brought its 'Sayabot' to receive the sanction letter from bank officials. In a video, the robot dressed in saree and other traditional adornments was seen taking the letter on behalf of its company. Innovative occurrence left the internet in awe of the personalisedtech gesture as the clip went viral on Twitter. Check out robot taking loan in the video below.Do Snakes Have Legs? Viral Video Shows Snake Walking With Robotic Legs Thanks to an Engineer Who Decided To Play God!

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Robot Takes Loan! Robotics Company Brings 'Sayabot' Dressed in Saree To Receive Loan Sanction Letter From - LatestLY

Ambi Robotics returns to Berkeley and expands headquarters – Robotics and Automation News

Ambi Robotics, a provider of AI-powered robotic parcel sorting systems for supply chain operations, has unveiled its new headquarters in Berkeley, California to support company growth and new product development.

Ambi Robotics is ramping up installations of AmbiSort systems ahead of peak season as more shipping and logistics brands grapple with surging ecommerce demand.

The new headquarters boasts 33,000 square feet of space for the company to continue its mission to solve the supply chains most complex problems while helping people handle more than ever before.

Jim Liefer, CEO of Ambi Robotics, says: Relocating our headquarters back to Berkeley was a logical step in our business growth strategy.

This decision was fueled by the need to accommodate the growth of our company as we remain focused on deployments and supporting the implementation of hundreds of AmbiSort AI-powered robotic sorting systems in production across the US.

The new office location will accommodate the capacity for growing teams in customer support, engineering, AI research, operations, and software development.

The new Berkeley headquarters footprint increased over 500 percent as the team more than quadrupled its size in one year. Ambi Robotics was previously located in a 6,000 square foot office space in Emeryville, California.

Stephen McKinley, co-founder and VP of operations at Ambi Robotics, says: We are thrilled to be closer to where it all began, just a few miles from the heart of the UC Berkeley campus where our founding team met while pursuing our PhDs.

Ambi Robotics is built on the power of people people working together to build extraordinary systems that empower our workforce to handle more. We are building a one-of-a-kind headquarters to foster the growth of our dedicated team and an environment that empowers our team at Ambi Robotics to handle more too.

The newly remodeled headquarters, now re-architected and designed to support the development of advanced supply chain technologies, boasts features that build the human experience for all employees.

Sandra Kazee, VP of finance at Ambi Robotics, says: At Ambi Robotics, we believe that when people are respected and valued, they become more engaged.

We are committed to building an inclusive working environment for our team where all employees can be their best, authentic selves.

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Ambi Robotics returns to Berkeley and expands headquarters - Robotics and Automation News

‘First-of-its-kind’ $50 million fund launches for early-stage robotics, automation, and AI companies – Robotics and Automation News

Cybernetix Ventures, an independent venture capital firm investing in early-stage robotics, automation and AI technology companies, today announced the launch of its first global fund headquartered in Boston, Massachusetts.

Cybernetix Fund I will focus on pre-seed, seed and Series A investments into companies in the US and around the world developing robotics solutions for manufacturing, logistics, construction, and healthcare verticals.

The fund will also invest in key robotics-enabling software companies in AI/machine learning, cloud robotics, cybersecurity, autonomy and sensors/edge computing.

The funds general partner Fady Saad is an MIT alumnus and co-founder of MassRobotics, the largest robotics startup escalator in the United States, supporting more than 60 resident startups at its Boston shared office and laboratory facility.

He architected MassRobotics corporate partnership and scaling program, building formal partnerships with more than 40 corporates.

A Boston Business Journal 40 Under 40 honoree, he has been heavily involved in the robotics innovation and investment community made up of entrepreneurs, researchers and technologists from around the world.

Saad also brings international business management and development experience from multinational technology firms Siemens and Nokia.

General partner Mark Martin, a Cornell and Tufts University alumnus, has been an investor, board observer and advisor for over 20 startups in SaaS, IoT and sensor technologies.

As a VP of industrial automation, sensors and IoT at Analog Devices, he led an organization with over 600 employees and $1 billion annual revenue.

Martin has extensive mergers and acquisition experience, overseeing the sale of two business units valued at over $450 million combined and the acquisition of four businesses valued at over $100 million combined during his tenure at Analog Devices.

Martin scaled the companys presence in Asia while based in Hong Kong for three years. He has also been on MassRobotics advisory board.

Cybernetix portfolio companies will benefit from the funds unprecedented access to the robotics ecosystem, corporate relationships, deep industry knowledge and insights, and other critical finance, business and manufacturing resources.

Saad says: With the launch of Cybernetix Ventures, robotics startups will have access to a one-of-a-kind fund which is from the robotics community, led by robotics leaders, for robotics innovators.

Its clear to us that robotics is a distinct investment class, separate from established categories like software and biotech, with its own investment models, metrics and portfolio engagement.

The majority of investors are just starting to figure out the true value of innovative, early-stage robotics opportunities. With the establishment of this fund, were here to influence what will have the greatest long-term impacts, and share the full extent of our expertise and networks with the companies we believe in.

Martin says: Its only in the last few years that weve seen the arrival of robotics unicorns and funding rounds with multi-billion dollar valuations as part of an accelerating robotics ecosystem.

So this marks an exciting time to be supporting and guiding the next crop of companies in the industry with outsize potential.

Couple that with the intensifying labor shortage in our key verticals, and you have a strong rationale why the time is perfect for us to launch this new fund.

Cybernetix Ventures has an advisory board consisting of seven distinguished leaders in their respective fields:

Steve Ricci: former partner at Flagship Ventures, and former president of the New England Venture Capital Association, bringing more than 30 years of early stage venture capital investment experience.

Helen Greiner: co-founder, former chairman and president of pioneering robotics company iRobot and CEO of Tertill, a recognized leader in the robotics field for more than 35 years.

Peter Wurman: co-founder and former CTO of Kiva Systems, a manufacturer of mobile robotic fulfillment systems acquired by Amazon and rebranded to Amazon Robotics. He is currently Sonys AI America director and was inducted into the National Inventors Hall of Fame in 2020.

Rick Faulk: CEO of Locus Robotics and former CEO of Quiet Logistics, has more than 30 years of experience in the logistics industry.

Elaine Chen: a well-known roboticist, currently director of the Derby Entrepreneurship Center at Tufts University and former entrepreneur-in-residence at the Martin Trust Center for MIT Entrepreneurship.

Amar Sawhney: prolific serial entrepreneur in the medical devices industry, currently CEO of Pramand, CEO and Chairman of Instylla. Some of his previous companies were acquired by Boston Scientific, Covidian and Genzyme.

Dennis Clarke: Chairman and CEO of Boston-based commercial real estate development company, Cummings Properties, and brings a wealth of experience in the construction industry.

Ricci says: Theres never been a venture capital team like this before, purpose-built and ready from day one to identify and target the most compelling opportunities at the intersection of robotics, automation, and AI.

We already have seen the team putting their wealth of knowledge, experience, and network into their current investments.

Cybernetix Ventures has already built an investment portfolio of leading early stage robotics and AI companies covering their target technology and market sectors.

Derrick Morse, CEO of portfolio company, Rugged Robotics, says: After meeting Fady and Mark, I quickly realized the power of their network and experience, and I knew I had to get them onto our cap table.

We were massively oversubscribed, but its important to have investors who really know the market and technology, understand the challenges of driving early-stage robotics companies, and can really engage on the important challenges we face as we grow the business. Were thrilled to have their support.

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'First-of-its-kind' $50 million fund launches for early-stage robotics, automation, and AI companies - Robotics and Automation News

Startup uWare Robotics develops ‘first’ complete system to map and monitor coastal ecosystems – Robotics and Automation News

A Belgian-Spanish startup called uWare Robotics says it has developed the first end-to-end technology to map and monitor coastal ecosystems.

uWare says its system consists of a number of proprietary hardware and software technologies, including an autonomous underwater vehicle, called the uOne.

Designed for maximum mobility, stability, cost-effectiveness, and autonomy, the uOne allows for data collection at five times the speed of a diver and with the precision of a robot, claims uWare.

Being autonomous and untethered, the uOne can cover vast areas by itself, eliminating the risk to human life. It is electric and quiet and can be launched from shore, reducing the environmental impact of a monitoring operation.

The uOne communicates with the uBuoy another of uWares inventions using the companys proprietary acoustic communication modem, the uCom to provide live mission updates and accept new mission commands.

The uOne seamlessly integrates with uWares software system that employs machine learning and computer vision to provide automated 2D and 3D map generation, intelligent visual inspection (for example, pollution spotting), and environmental and biodiversity data analysis.

In its press kit, uWare says: We have combined the latest technology in Robotics and AI, with open source software and proprietary electronics, to offer a solution that is safe, efficient, reliable, and cost-effective.

Our technology allows users to monitor and generate real intelligence out of the data they gather in the form of map generation, visual inspection and environmental data analysis.

By making our solution affordable and accessible to marine protected areas, conservation societies, and other relevant organizations we can ensure they have the necessary temporal data to keep ecosystems healthy, offer more advanced restoration efforts, and advise policymakers on their protection.

uWare says its target markets include:

The business model uWare has adopted involves hiring out its hardware on a mission basis and its software is available through subscription. There are three versions of the uOne Standard, Medium and Pro. The company claims its early adopter program offers pretty much everything almost free.

uWare says it expects to have fully autonomous, underwater worker bots using cost-effective internet of underwater things departing from our autonomous mothership in the future.

It adds: We can already envision a swarm of uOnes autonomously restoring a coral reef or managing a mariculture farm.

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Startup uWare Robotics develops 'first' complete system to map and monitor coastal ecosystems - Robotics and Automation News

Serve Robotics partners with Piestro to deliver robot-made pizzas – Robotics and Automation News

Piestro, a maker of a robotic pizzeria, is partnering with Serve Robotics, a maker of autonomous sidewalk delivery robots, to offer customers a totally robotic pizza delivery service.

When a customer places an order, Piestros scheduling system will notify Serves fleet and the nearest available robot will pick up the pizza for transport from a Piestro pod.

The partnership will roll out in the coming months, as Piestro deploys units within Serve delivery areas.

Massimo De Marco, CEO of Piestro, says: We couldnt be more excited to partner with Serve Robotics to offer our customers the convenience and delight of robotic delivery.

Robotic delivery is contactless and reliable, with a higher on-time rate than couriers, and will allow our customers to get their pizzas even faster than before all at the touch of their fingertips.

Serves robots fit up to four Piestro pizzas and can complete deliveries in under 15 minutes. Once the robot arrives at its destination, customers can retrieve their pizzas from the machine with a secure passcode. Serves autonomous sidewalk robots navigate safely alongside pedestrians, with remote supervision when needed.

Ali Kashani, co-founder and CEO of Serve Robotics, says: Serves zero-emission robots are distinguished by their level of autonomy and safety, outperforming vehicle delivery in key metrics like on-time arrival and order completion.

Combining the reliability of robotic delivery with Piestros tasty pizzas is a perfect match. Together, we offer customers a quick, contactless experience that also benefits the environment.

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Serve Robotics partners with Piestro to deliver robot-made pizzas - Robotics and Automation News

Ondas Holdings American Robotics to Add New Artificial Intelligence Anomaly Detection Capabilities to its … – AccessWire

New loss of containment capabilities will enable automatic detection of crude oil loss at oil and gas facilities

WALTHAM, MA / ACCESSWIRE / July 26, 2022 / Ondas Holdings Inc. (Nasdaq:ONDS), a leading provider of private wireless data, drone and automated data solutions through its wholly owned subsidiaries, Ondas Networks Inc. and American Robotics, Inc. ("American Robotics" or "AR"), announced today that American Robotics is adding new artificial intelligence anomaly detection capabilities to its autonomous Scout System drone. Loss of containment capabilities will enable oil and gas customers to minimize environmental risks, clean-up costs, fines, and litigation expenses. This new analytics feature is the first being introduced in connection with our strategic partnership with Dynam.AI, a leading edge provider of AI/ML development tools and services. Additional software-driven data analytics features targeted for the O&G markets are expected to be introduced in the second half of 2022.

"On the heels of our announcement of new high-resolution RGB and thermal camera payloads, American Robotics continues to enhance our offerings for current and future customers in the oil and gas industry," said Reese Mozer, co-founder and CEO of American Robotics. "This analytics feature is the first to be announced from our industry-optimized product roadmap put in place early last year. We have worked closely with our customers to define these requirements on route to fleet deployments, and we are grateful for their partnership."

The loss of containment analytics feature will accelerate early detection and location of crude oil leaks before they become critical to customers by providing frequent, autonomous inspections of oil and gas pumpjacks, heater treaters, tanks, pipes, pumps, and more via the autonomous Scout System. Autonomous drones have become a crucial component to ensuring safety and conducting regular inspections within the oil and gas industry. Through artificial intelligence anomaly detection capabilities tailor-made for the oil and gas industry, American Robotics is providing customers with the tools they need to reduce reputational risk resulting in loss of revenue and brand value, while minimizing environmental risk and costs associated with clean-ups.

A recent Market Research Future report predicted that the market size for drones in the oil and gas industry is projected to be worth over $23 billion by 2027. By continuing to add new features to its Scout System specifically for the oil and gas industry, American Robotics is further establishing itself as the market-leading autonomous drone-in-a-box (DIB) solution for the oil and gas sector. Combined with the high-resolution thermal and RGB camera payloads, the loss of containment analytics feature deepens and expands American Robotics' competitive differentiation within the oil and gas vertical.

A prototype of the loss of containment analytics feature is targeted for release in Q3 2022. To learn more about American Robotics and its Scout System drone, click here.

About Ondas Holdings Inc.Ondas Holdings Inc. ("Ondas") is a leading provider of private wireless data and drone solutions through its wholly owned subsidiaries Ondas Networks Inc. ("Ondas Networks") and American Robotics, Inc. ("American Robotics" or "AR"). Ondas Networks is a developer of proprietary, software-based wireless broadband technology for large established and emerging industrial markets. Ondas Networks' standards-based (802.16s), multi-patented, software-defined radio FullMAX platform enables Mission-Critical IoT (MC-IoT) applications by overcoming the bandwidth limitations of today's legacy private licensed wireless networks. Ondas Networks' customer end markets include railroads, utilities, oil and gas, transportation, aviation (including drone operators) and government entities whose demands span a wide range of mission critical applications. American Robotics designs, develops, and markets industrial drone solutions for rugged, real-world environments. AR's Scout System is a highly automated, AI-powered drone system capable of continuous, remote operation and is marketed as a "drone-in-a-box" turnkey data solution service under a Robot-as-a-Service (RAAS) business model. The Scout System is the first drone system approved by the FAA for automated operation beyond-visual-line-of-sight (BVLOS) without a human operator on-site. Ondas Networks and American Robotics together provide users in oil & gas, rail, mining, agriculture, and critical infrastructure markets with improved connectivity and data collection capabilities.

For additional information on Ondas Networks and Ondas Holdings, visit http://www.ondas.com or follow Ondas Networks on Twitter and LinkedIn. For additional information on American Robotics, visit http://www.american-robotics.com or follow American Robotics on Twitter and LinkedIn.

Information on our websites and social media platforms is not incorporated by reference in this release or in any of our filings with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.

Forward-Looking StatementsStatements made in this release that are not statements of historical or current facts are "forward-looking statements" within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. We caution readers that forward-looking statements are predictions based on our current expectations about future events. These forward-looking statements are not guarantees of future performance and are subject to risks, uncertainties and assumptions that are difficult to predict. Our actual results, performance, or achievements could differ materially from those expressed or implied by the forward-looking statements as a result of a number of factors, including the risks discussed under the heading "Risk Factors" discussed under the caption "Item 1A. Risk Factors" in Part I of our most recent Annual Report on Form 10-K or any updates discussed under the caption "Item 1A. Risk Factors" in Part II of our Quarterly Reports on Form 10-Q and in our other filings with the SEC. We undertake no obligation to publicly update or revise any forward-looking statements, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise that occur after that date, except as required by law.

ContactsMedia Contact for Ondas Holdings Inc.Derek Reisfield, President and CFOOndas Holdings Inc.888.350.9994 x1019[emailprotected]

Media Contact for American Robotics Payton St. LawrenceBIGfish Communications for American Robotics[emailprotected] 617-713-3800

Investor Relations ContactCody Cree and Matt Glover Gateway Group, Inc.949-574-3860[emailprotected]

SOURCE: Ondas Holdings Inc.

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Ondas Holdings American Robotics to Add New Artificial Intelligence Anomaly Detection Capabilities to its ... - AccessWire

This Black Robotics Professor Is Diversifying Engineering With Robot Poetry And STEM Romance Novels – Black Enterprise

The lack of Black representation in STEM jobs is still an overwhelming race and gender gap.

Only 5% of Black students obtained masters and research doctoral degrees in engineering or physical science during the 2017-2018 school year, as explained by anApril 2021 Pew Research Center article STEM Jobs See Uneven Progress in Increasing Gender, Racial and Ethnic Diversity,

For Carlotta Berry, Ph.D., anElectrical and Computer Engineering professor at Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology, she is among the less than 200 Black women engineering professors in the United States, according to Forbes. She believes that the major gap is contributed by the underrepresentation of both Black and female students in STEM related academic programs.

With that said, Berry aims to bring more students across the finish line by changing the face of the STEM profession. Her efforts include making STEM exciting to a broader audience by injecting art and sharing it in new and exciting ways, she told the publication.

Engineering has a marketing problem, Berry further explained. Even after many years of interventions to seed the pipeline, the most recognizable figures in engineering are still nerdy, antisocial white men like Dilbert, Sheldon, Spencer Reid or MacGyver.

Here are some of the ways in which Berry is changing the face of the STEM profession and attracting more underrepresented populations and women to the field.

During a professional sabbatical, Berry first founded an educational consulting firm company NoireSTEMinist which sheoffers workshops, presentations and demonstrations on diversity in STEM, women in STEM, mobile robotics education, and engineering education.

Her motto My STEM is for the streets, taking it out of the classroom to connect with people on their turf, reflects her commitment tobringing STEM to people and bringing people to STEM in order to diversify the engineering field.

On YouTube, Berry lays down STEM-inspired tracks on hip hop beats in order to maintain the students interest in robotics. She cleverly names her robots after prominent figures in Black history such as Harriet Tubman, Rosa Parks, and Martin Luther King Jr.

In one of her latest poems,Harriet Tugman, A Robot Soldier, Berry explains the unique identifiers of the Tubman such as its two encoders.

A published author of many technical publications, Berry has also leveraged her innovative skills to publish a romance novel.Elevated Inferno: Monets Moment, independently published in June 2022, tells the story of protagonist Monet Parker who is in search for love all while trying to land herdream internship and prepare herself for a career in social robotics.

Berry said she began writing fictional books with Black women in STEM as the main characters to normalize seeing them as they balanced the demands of their personal and professional lives, per Forbes,

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This Black Robotics Professor Is Diversifying Engineering With Robot Poetry And STEM Romance Novels - Black Enterprise

Q&A: Warehouse robots that feel by sight | MIT News | Massachusetts Institute of Technology – MIT News

More than a decade ago, Ted Adelson set out to create tactile sensors for robots that would give them a sense of touch. The result? A handheld imaging system powerful enough to visualize the raised print on a dollar bill. The technology was spun into GelSight, to answer an industry need for low-cost, high-resolution imaging.

An expert in both human and machine vision, Adelson was pleased to have created something useful. But he never lost sight of his original dream: to endow robots with a sense of touch. In a new Science Hub project with Amazon, hes back on the case. He plans to build out the GelSight system with added capabilities to sense temperature and vibrations. A professor in MITs Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences, Adelson recently sat down to talk about his work.

Q: What makes the human hand so hard to recreate in a robot?

A: A human finger has soft, sensitive skin, which deforms as it touches things. The question is how to get precise sensing when the sensing surface itself is constantly moving and changing during manipulation.

Q: Youre an expert on human and computer vision. How did touch grab your interest?

A: When my daughters were babies, I was amazed by how skillfully they used their fingers and hands to explore the world. I wanted to understand the way they were gathering information through their sense of touch. Being a vision researcher, I naturally looked for a way to do it with cameras.

Q: How does the GelSight robot finger work? What are its limitations?

A: A camera captures an image of the skin from inside, and a computer vision system calculates the skins 3D deformation. GelSight fingers offer excellent tactile acuity, far exceeding that of human fingers. However, the need for an inner optical system limits the sizes and shapes we can achieve today.

Q: How did you come up with the idea of giving a robot finger a sense of touch by, in effect, giving it sight?

A: A camera can tell you about the geometry of the surface it is viewing. By putting a tiny camera inside the finger, we can measure how the skin geometry is changing from point to point. This tells us about tactile properties like force, shape, and texture.

Q: How did your prior work on cameras figure in?

A: My prior research on the appearance of reflective materials helped me engineer the optical properties of the skin. We create a very thin matte membrane and light it with grazing illumination so all the details can be seen.

Q: Did you know there was a market for measuring 3D surfaces?

A: No. My postdoc Kimo Johnson posted a YouTube video showing GelSights capabilities about a decade ago. The video went viral, and we got a flood of email with interesting suggested applications. People have since used the technology for measuring the microtexture of shark skin, packed snow, and sanded surfaces. The FBI uses it in forensics to compare spent cartridge casings.

Q: Whats GelSights main application?

A: Industrial inspection. For example, an inspector can press a GelSight sensor against a scratch or bump on an airplane fuselage to measure its exact size and shape in 3D. This application may seem quite different from the original inspiration of baby fingers, but it shows that tactile sensing can have many uses. As for robotics, tactile sensing is mainly a research topic right now, but we expect it to increasingly be useful in industrial robots.

Q: Youre now building in a way to measure temperature and vibrations. How do you do that with a camera? How else will you try to emulate human touch?

A: You can convert temperature to a visual signal that a camera can read by using liquid crystals, the molecules that make mood rings and forehead thermometers change color. For vibrations we will use microphones. We also want to extend the range of shapes a finger can have. Finally, we need to understand how to use the information coming from the finger to improve robotics.

Q: Why are we sensitive to temperature and vibrations, and why is that useful for robotics?

A: Identifying material properties is an important aspect of touch. Sensing temperature helps you tell whether something is metal or wood, and whether it is wet or dry. Vibrations can help you distinguish a slightly textured surface, like unvarnished wood, from a perfectly smooth surface, like wood with a glossy finish.

Q: Whats next?

A: Making a tactile sensor is the first step. Integrating it into a useful finger and hand comes next. Then you have to get the robot to use the hand to perform real-world tasks.

Q: Evolution gave us five fingers and two hands. Will robots have the same?

A: Different robots will have different kinds of hands, optimized for different situations. Big hands, small hands, hands with three fingers or six fingers, and hands we cant even imagine today. Our goal is to provide the sensing capability, so that the robot can skillfully interact with the world.

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Q&A: Warehouse robots that feel by sight | MIT News | Massachusetts Institute of Technology - MIT News

Acceleration Robotics and Harvard Present Collaborative Research – HPCwire

VITORIA-GASTEIZ, Spain, July 25, 2022 Acceleration Robotics a robotics semiconductor startup based in the Basque Country, Spain together with Prof. Vijay Janapa Reddi from Harvard University and researchers at the Harvard Edge Computing Lab will present next October in Japan their latest work on democratizing the use of hardware acceleration in robotics in a scalable, vendor- and technology-agnostic manner. Titled as RobotCore: An Open Architecture for Hardware Acceleration in ROS 2, their paper describes and discloses a reference implementation of the architectural pillars and the programming conventions required to introduce hardware acceleration in robotics in a sustainable manner, avoiding semiconductor vendor lock-ins. Shortly, hardware acceleration allows the creation of custom compute architectures that exploit compute parallelism. Instead of building solely on CPUs, with hardware acceleration (through FPGAs or GPUs) roboticists can empower faster robots, with reduced computation times, lower power consumption and more deterministic responses. The core idea behind their research is to facilitate the process of using this technology which, according to the researchers, with the current solutions requires expertise in each specific hardware (acceleration) platform.

The research effort is led by Vctor Mayoral-Vilches, an experienced roboticist and a former Systems Architect at Xilinx (now AMD) who left the company to create his own startup (Acceleration Robotics) that focuses on creating these robot accelerators, or semiconductor building blocks for robots mixing CPUs, FPGAs and GPUs. The whole group together demonstrated their Open Architecture against the Robot Operating System (ROS 2), a popular event-driven programming interface for building robot applications. The resulting robot accelerators deliver significant computation speedups when compared to modern CPU performance.

Robots are deterministic machines, said Mayoral-Vilches. Meeting time deadlines in their computations is the most important feature. Their behaviors take the form of computational graphs, with data flowing between Nodes, across physical networks (communication buses) and while mapping to underlying sensors and actuators. The popular choice to build graphs for robots these days is ROS. Most companies building real robots use ROS or similar event-driven software frameworks, but they do so in a CPU-centric manner. We demonstrated in our work how hardware acceleration combining FPGAs and GPUs properly can revolutionize robotics, increasing determinism and speeding up robot response times enabling new applications with robots.

This piece of research also allows us to easily compare and benchmark different compute solutions in robotics and paves the way towards enabling roboticists to prototype hardware designs for robots in silicon while maintaining the common development practices in robotics. Their results were demonstrated with ROS 2, a popular robotics development kit but it can also be used with other robotics frameworks. Their paper has been accepted at the International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS), one of the most prestigious venues in robotics, and will be presented next October in Kyoto.

About Acceleration Robotics

Acceleration Robotics is a firm focused on designing customized brains for robots to hasten their response time. Founded by top robotic experts to deliver semiconductor building blocks for robots, the company leverages GPUs and FPGAs to create custom hardware that speeds up a robots operation.

About Harvard Edge Computing Lab

The Edge Computing Lab resides in the John A. Paulson School of Engineering and Applied Sciences at Harvard University. Its team of computer system architects specializes in edge computing platforms, with expertise in understanding the interactions across the circuits, architecture, and software layers.

Source: Acceleration Robotics

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Acceleration Robotics and Harvard Present Collaborative Research - HPCwire