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When your office environment is genuinely filled with people who are rocket scientists, chances are that you’re bound to come up a bright idea or two. Such is the case with JPL’s ATHLETE (All-Terrain Hex-Legged Extra-Terrestrial Explorer) robot, which was developed by JPL with the help of Boeing, Stanford University, and NASA’s Johnson and Ames Centers. According to the NASA ATHLETE project page, JPL has been hard at work on a new autonomous robotic vehicle concept that combines six legs (capped with wheels) that each feature six degrees of freedom (DOF).

The current version has a paylod capacity of 450 kg, but future variants will be larger and more capable. JPL hopes that robotic vehicles developed under the ATHLETE project will eventually be able to cross most terrain types, have a 10-year life cycle (under hostile conditions), and “Demonstrate a useful ‘voice and gesture’ command mode to enable suited astronauts to interact with these vehicles.”

It all sounds very impressive, but let’s be honest: I’m sure at least one NASA engineer has entertained the thought of covering this thing with brown bristles, slapping on some plastic fangs, and sticking on some LED-powered peepers. What better way to scare the bejesus out of your neighbors at Halloween than to have a monstrous robotic tarantula-like thing at your beck and call? (And yes, I do know that tarantula have eight legs, not six. Don’t mess with my feeble attempt to turn this into the ultimate Halloween prop.)

Check out the NASA/JPL ATHLETE rover system page for some additional photos and video clips of this impressive new robot in action.

_{(Photo:© NASA/JPL Source: JPL ATHLETE rover system page) [- Jeff James]}

Building a small robot these days is far easier than it used to be, thanks in part to the introduction of products like LEGO Mindstorms and the Vex Robotics Design System. But what if you’re looking for something even simpler to construct, or perhaps you want to introduce robotics to a young child? A new robotics product dubbed roBlocks may be just what you’re looking for.

And I do mean simple: There aren’t any gears, sensors, tiny plastic pieces, or other microscopic bits or geegaws you have to fiddle with to contruct a functional robot. Using a variety of actuator, sensor, and operator blocks, roBlocks claims that you can simply snap them together to create simple robots. Each block is a 40mm cube, and magnets help the blocks snap together easily.

According to the roBlocks Web site, the product began as a research project led by PhD candidate Eric Schweikardt and Professor Mark D. Gross at Carnegie Mellon University. Pittsburgh’s WTAE-TV recently aired a story which shows the roBlocks in action, and also provides some additional background info on the project from the CMU team that developed the roBlocks system.

The roBlocks Web site indicates that the product will be available for sale in December 2008, and pricing wasn’t yet available.    

_{(Photo:© roBlocks Source: roBlocks) [- Jeff James]}

While we’re not quite to the level of teleporting cancerous growths from a patient to the medical waste bin yet, Montreal’s Jewish General Hospital (JGH) has taken us a step closer to a future where robotic surgeons may be commonplace.  

Surgeons at JGH will reportedly use the new robotic, assisted-surgery device to treat gynecological and prostate cancers. According to a news release from JGH, use of the da Vinci surgical robot will lead to “shorter operation times, less blood loss, and a decrease in possible complications.”

“It has become increasingly evident that prostatectomies performed with robotic technology lead to a significant decrease in incidence of sexual dysfunction and incontinence improving the daily lives of our patients,” said Dr. Jacques Corcos, Director of the Robotics Program and Chief of the Department of Urology at the Jewish General Hospital. “This knowledge is based on current research being conducted at the JGH, and is part of a larger design, a Robotics Program in affiliation with all six of Quebec’s universities.”

Check out the JGH da Vinci robotic page for more info.

_{(Photo:© JGH Source: Montreal Jewish General Hospital) [- Jeff James]}

After a lengthy hiatus, Nxtbot.com will soon be updated with a new look, much more content, and lots of other long-overdue improvements. Before all that can happen, however, some sorely needed maintenance is in order.

If any of you reading this happen to have a blog, you’ll understand what an evil scourge spam comments are. I typically see hundreds of them every day, and they quickly clog up the the admin side of things. Who wants to spend 30 minutes a day searching through piles of spam to find a handful of legitimate comments? Not me, so I decided to install a comment spam filter.

There are a bunch of spam filters out there, but I decided on reCAPTCHA, a nifty blog spam blocker developed by some big-brained folks at Carnegie Mellon University. You’ve undoubtedly seen these before: now that reCAPTCHA is installed, you’ll need to decipher two blurry text strings (see static image above for an example) before you can post comments on the site. It’s a small inconvenience, but it saves us all from the scourge of blog spam.

What really impressed me about reCAPTCHA is that is actually does something with all of our fuzzy-word deciphering efforts. All of those words we decipher are actually being spit out by an OCR program that is having trouble deciphering them. In essence, we ‘re all helping digitize literary works for a good cause, and reCAPTCHA makes that possible.

Here’s a blurb from the reCAPTCHA side that explains things better than I can:

About 60 million CAPTCHAs are solved by humans around the world every day. In each case, roughly ten seconds of human time are being spent. Individually, that’s not a lot of time, but in aggregate these little puzzles consume more than 150,000 hours of work each day. What if we could make positive use of this human effort? reCAPTCHA does exactly that by channeling the effort spent solving CAPTCHAs online into “reading” books.  

So there you have it. Now that I’ve sorted my spam problems, it’s time to get working on that new site logo…. [- Jeff James]

Okay, this may not be breaking news: The Tyco NSECT came out in late 2006, so those of you who’ve heard about this gadget can move on to something more timely. I did come across one of these R/C bugs not long ago while shopping at a local big box store, and the thing looked suitably cool enough to write a bit about.

The six-legged gizmo can scurry forwards and backwards, and its plastic mandible can be opened and closed. The two features that stood out for me were the carapace-mounted missle launcher (that fires those little foam Nerf darts with the sucker tips) and a eye-color changing function. You can see the NSECT in action via this corporate NSECT video on YouTube, or you can check out the Amazon.com listing.

Other R/C robots may offer more functionality, but the prospect of having a missile-firing, eye-color-changing monstrosity smash through a miniature LEGO city is an image that appeals to me. (Source: Tyco RC) [- Jeff James]

Timed to coincide with the release of the new Simpsons movie, a Homer Simpson-skinned version of Wowwee’s Robosapien toy has just been sighted trampling Springfield in various gadget shops on the Internet. It appears that the product is primarily available in the UK, as I’ve yet to find a North American shop that’s selling one.

Regardless, Homersapien features a bevy of features that Simpsons fans should recognize. Here’s an excerpt from a product description over at UK-based retailer Gadgetshop:

With 67 new pre-programmed functions, Homersapien can pick up objects, throw objects, kick objects and dance around the room as well as the more expected “Homerisms” such as belching, snoring, farting, and the classic Homer “Doh!” - he’s even programmed with a number of Kung Fu moves! Homersapien is pre-programmed with catchphrases galore taken from all manner of shows from various series’ and even has his own Krusty Burger cup which he holds so dear.

Now that everyone’s favorite underachieving (albeit lovable) slacker had been roboticized, will he go the way of Futurama’s Bender and turn to the consumption of alcohol for energy? Or perhaps the Asahi beer-bot can be modded to dispense Duff-brand beer? Regardless, it’s clear that Homer has more technical wherewithal than we’ve previously given him credit for. (Source: Gadgetshop) [- Jeff James]

Since iRobot decided to release its iRobot Create do-it-yourself robot kit, robotics fans everywhere have been brainstorming the possibilities of what they could concoct with this relatively affordable Scooba/Roomba device. And, it sparked at least one challenge sponsored by Tom’s Hardware, the iRobot Create Challenge.

Just what is that challenge? Well, they “threw down the gauntlet” (in their own words) to Roomba hackers around the globe a short while back, prodding them to get involved in iRobot’s contest, which ended June 30, to come up with the most remarkable robot possible with the Create platform. Booty for the winner is the tidy sum of $5,000.

Since that time, ideas, submissions and accomplishments have been coming in and the folks at Tom’s Hardware decided to share a few of the more public ones with its readers (some contestants are staying tight-lipped on their creations). Among the offerings are iRobots that play tennis, scan homes for intruders, recreate art or digital photos, assist people with disabilities and, surely one of the best, a robotic pooper scooper (provided it’s not too proactive in its duties). For the full scoop, check out Tom’s Hardware and the iRobot Create Challenge forums. (Source: Tom’s Hardware) - [Chuck Miller]

According to a news release over at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI), a vessel (loaded with a few robotic submersibles) will soon be headed to the Arctic to search for signs of life on what WHOI dubs “…the seafloor of the world’s most isolated ocean.” The Swedish icebreaker Oden will serve as the transportation for a 30-member research team and a trio of new autonomous underwater vehicles (AUVs) developed for the mission: the Jaguar (pictured), the Puma and the CAMPER.

The 40-day mission — officially called the Arctic Gakkel Vents Expedition (AGAVE) begins on July 1st. One wonders if the WHOI folks anticipated a mission acronym that reminds people of tequila (which is created from the fermented sap of a blue agave plant) more than deep-water hydrothermal vent research, but I digress.

The Chief Scientist of the mission is WHOI geophysicist Robert Reves-Sohn, who summarized the focus of the mission in this comment from the news release:

“This is an exciting opportunity to explore and study a portion of Earth’s surface that has been largely inaccessible to science,” said Reves-Sohn. “Any biological habitats at hydrothermal vent fields along the Gakkel Ridge have likely evolved in isolation for tens of millions of years. We may have the opportunity to lay eyes on completely new life forms that have been living in the abyss beneath the Arctic ice pack.”

Kidding about the mission acronym aside, this expedition looks like a promising use of robotic technology to help researchers unlock the secrets of life in extreme environments, which could have numerous benefits for robotic exploration in other areas. NASA and the National Science Foundation (NSF) must agree, as both are contributing significant amounts of funding for the program. (Source: WHOI) - [Jeff James]

[Update: Click here to view the WALL-E Trailer] - Over the years we’ve seen a bundle of robot films, from the adaptation of Isaac Asimov’s I, Robot, the Terminator series, and the forgettable Short Circuit films. An upcoming film about a robot uprising (starring Shrek-star Mike Meyers) is also in the works.

One of the most promising new films may be WALL-E, a new Pixar animated film slated for release in June 2008. TIME Magazine drops a few hints about the flick in its June 18th issue that presents this summary: “The year is 2700. WALL• E, a robot, spends every day doing what he was made for. But soon, he will discover what he was meant for.”

This sounds a bit like the “exploited robot seeks freedom” storyline we’ve seen elsewhere, but you have to admit that Pixar’s track record is phenomenal. Mark your calendars, as this one will likely be worth a trip to the local super-uber-megaplex to see on the big screen. (Source: TIME Magazine, /FILM) - [Jeff James]

My late grandfather owned a chicken coop, which regularly produced a few dozen yellow, fluffy chicks every year or so. If you’ve ever had the opportunity to spend much time around baby chickens, you’ll notice a few things:

Cuddly? Check. Yellow? Check. Cute? Check. Prone to crap on everything in sight and make a mess of your easter clothes? Unfortunately, a smelly check there as well.

Now Japanese toy maker Sega has developed a range of robotic baby chickens that remove the messy bits and retain the furry, cuddly parts of these popular critters. According to Reuters, the little gadgets will wiggle their wings and peep when stroked. They don’t do much else, but it’s obvious that the appeal of fuzzy little robots endures. Check out some additional Reuters photos and some video as well. (Source: Reuters) - [Jeff James]