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Robotics has made tremendous strides in replicating the senses of sight and sound, but smell and taste are still lagging behind, and touch was thought to be the most difficult of them all...until new pressure-sensitive electronic skin came along. More »
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What you see here is one of the 128 groups of "feet" that allow a centipede-like microrobot to move around. Made from an old microchip, this robot can carry a record-breaking seven times its own weight and has unprecedented mobility. More »
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One of the dreams of robotics has been to create a machine that can act as a remote version of its operator - like the movie Surrogates, only cool. Now a group of Korean engineers have brought us closer to this goal. More »
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Japan has debuted a giant robot baby that can mimic infantile behavior without being told what to do, and the video will send chills up your spine. More »
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Honda has found a way to connect your brain directly to its ASIMO bot, by directing the patterns of electric currents and cerebral blood flow. What's next: hands-free driving? More »
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BigDog has been weaponized, with gigantic freaking bull horns. You remember that scary-as-hell walking military bot, whose owners videotaped themselves slo-mo kicking the crap out of him? Now BigDog will have revenge. More »
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Just what we needed: A sweating robot. And did it need to have those creepy pipes instead of a face? Watch the vid for B.O. history in the making. Via Daily Mail, thanks Regis! More »
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Last week's robotic vagina may be the most pleasurable sex toy for men ever created, but we've found one that may be more educational and help modify your exercise routine. Yes, science does love you. More »
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A programmable robotic vagina that looks sort of like a cake mixer promises to be the most exciting sex toy ever invented for men. Basically, it's the rabbit pearl vibrator of boy toys. More »
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When you think of autonomous, unmanned spy vehicles, you probably imagine the telltale shape of a small aircraft overhead, and the suspicious sound of whirring propellers. Spy vehicles, however, aren't just for the sky anymore. The U.S. Navy has funded the development of an autonomous, unmanned vehicle shaped like a fish and capable of covering up to three times the distance of a typical UAV using the same battery. It's called GhostSwimmer, and it'll be entering our waters in 2009. More »
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The creepiest — or most exciting — thing you will see on YouTube today is this new video of the Repliee R-1, an android that just went for its first spin at the 2008 CEATEC Exhibition in Japan. Based on an actual five-year-old girl, this robot can speak, wave, walk, pick things up, and even sense when other objects touch its skin. And I'm having trouble not referring to it as "she," which should tell you how eerie the resemblance is between the Repliee R-1 and a physical human girl. More »
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When you come home from work at night, does your robot greet you at the door expectantly, or does it sit there impassively in its recharging node because it can't tell the difference between you, the mailman, and Emilio Estevez? Today's computer scientists are hard at work making sure tomorrow's robots won't leave you feeling emotionally shunned. Check out how researchers at the Carnegie Mellon University Robotics Institute are using something called "Active Appearance Modeling" to improve face recognition algorithms that will make your bot snap to attention when it sees your face. More »
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It may look like a smiling mecha puppy of vast proportions, but this suburb-eating robot is a vicious destroyer of suburbs and suburbanites whose giant legs pulverize housing tracts in order to plant new forests. The creation of Australian firm Andrew Maynard Architects, the suburb-eating robots will be deployed to clean up abandoned, decaying suburbs in Australia when peak oil forces people to stop driving cars and move into the urban centers. These mega-bots are going into production in 2019, and their engines will be fueled entirely by human fat. More »
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It looks like something out of a James Thurber illustration, with its headless body and backward-dog legs, but the Big Dog is real and autonomous. This video, by the Big Dog development team at Boston Dynamics, shows just how lifelike the bot is. It can carry over 300 pounds, and its engines make an alien whining noise. It can also, apparently, recover its balance after being kicked by its owner, in a scene that that is disturbing on a number of levels. More »
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