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DARPA Robotics Challenge trials to be held December 20-21
The development of robots capable of operating in a melange of disarray and hazards will allow relief agencies to reduce the danger to disaster victims and first responders alike. This is the goal of DARPA's multi-year Robotics Challenge, which in December will pit a variety of robots and software against a series of eight real-world tasks that might be encountered in actual disaster situations.
The DARPA Robotics Challenge is aimed at developing a robot that can work with humans at disaster sites, combining their strengths to overcome their weaknesses. While DARPA's Track A teams are developing their own robots as well as the software to attempt DARPA's challenges, Track B/C teams have been supplied with a Boston Dynamics ATLAS humanoid robot for which they will develop disaster-busting software.
The ATLAS humanoid robot is 74 in (188 cm) in height, 30 in (76 cm) from shoulder to shoulder, 22 in (56 cm) thick at the chest, and weighs 330 lb (150 kg) with its hydraulic power controller. It has 28 degrees of freedom in its basic skeleton and features an on-board control computer to convert higher-level commands it receives into the lower-level commands that actually direct the robot how to move. The power (480 three-phase VAC at 30 amps) and commands (via 10 Gbps fiber optic Ethernet) are supplied through a tether.
The virtual first round of the challenge was completed in June, involving a competition taking place in the Robotics Challenge Simulator. Six Track A teams and seven Track B/C teams qualified to continue on to the DARPA Robotics Trials to be held at Homestead Speedway in Florida on December 20-21, 2013.
The Track B winner was Team IHMC, from the Florida Institute for Human and Machine Cognition, which took the competition with a score 25 percent higher than Worcester Polytechnic's second-place showing. They took delivery of their ATLAS on August 14, and wasted no time in transferring the virtual ATLAS's software onto this impressive piece of hardware.
While the ATLAS appears in the video above to be a bit weak at the ankles, this is the type of problem expected to appear when transitioning from a model of a robot to controlling the real thing. Hopefully it will all get sorted before the trials, in which we are likely to see if these robots can stand up after a fall. The Boston Dynamics video below further demonstrates the obstacle-beating and exceptional balance capabilities of the humanoid robot.
ATLAS is designed to be able to carry out a range of movements, so that the robot can use as many tools and accesses designed for human use as possible; for example, this Worchester Polytechnic utility vehicle modified for the ATLAS trials with a field computer and a 480 volt generator.
To test these abilities and skills in the December trials, all robots will be tasked to complete the following: Driving a utility vehicle, walking across rubble, restoring access to a blocked entryway, opening a door and entering a building, climbing a ladder and walking (or crawling) across a catwalk, finding and closing a valve to stop the flow from a leaking pipe, and attaching a fire hose or other connector.
While the overall disaster scenario can be envisaged from these tasks, in this December's trial they will be taken on one at a time. Multiple attempts will not be allowed, nor will safety harnesses. If you break your robot, you break your robot. Let's wish the participants better luck than that.
Source: DARPA
Source: http://www.gizmag.com/darpa-atlas-robotics-challenge-walking-obstacles/29912/
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Founded by Russian entrepreneur Dmitry Itskov in February 2011 with the participation of leading Russian specialists in the field of neural interfaces, robotics, artificial organs and systems.
The main goals of the 2045 Initiative: the creation and realization of a new strategy for the development of humanity which meets global civilization challenges; the creation of optimale conditions promoting the spiritual enlightenment of humanity; and the realization of a new futuristic reality based on 5 principles: high spirituality, high culture, high ethics, high science and high technologies.
The main science mega-project of the 2045 Initiative aims to create technologies enabling the transfer of a individual’s personality to a more advanced non-biological carrier, and extending life, including to the point of immortality. We devote particular attention to enabling the fullest possible dialogue between the world’s major spiritual traditions, science and society.
A large-scale transformation of humanity, comparable to some of the major spiritual and sci-tech revolutions in history, will require a new strategy. We believe this to be necessary to overcome existing crises, which threaten our planetary habitat and the continued existence of humanity as a species. With the 2045 Initiative, we hope to realize a new strategy for humanity's development, and in so doing, create a more productive, fulfilling, and satisfying future.
The "2045" team is working towards creating an international research center where leading scientists will be engaged in research and development in the fields of anthropomorphic robotics, living systems modeling and brain and consciousness modeling with the goal of transferring one’s individual consciousness to an artificial carrier and achieving cybernetic immortality.
An annual congress "The Global Future 2045" is organized by the Initiative to give platform for discussing mankind's evolutionary strategy based on technologies of cybernetic immortality as well as the possible impact of such technologies on global society, politics and economies of the future.
Future prospects of "2045" Initiative for society
2015-2020
The emergence and widespread use of affordable android "avatars" controlled by a "brain-computer" interface. Coupled with related technologies “avatars’ will give people a number of new features: ability to work in dangerous environments, perform rescue operations, travel in extreme situations etc.
Avatar components will be used in medicine for the rehabilitation of fully or partially disabled patients giving them prosthetic limbs or recover lost senses.
2020-2025
Creation of an autonomous life-support system for the human brain linked to a robot, ‘avatar’, will save people whose body is completely worn out or irreversibly damaged. Any patient with an intact brain will be able to return to a fully functioning bodily life. Such technologies will greatly enlarge the possibility of hybrid bio-electronic devices, thus creating a new IT revolution and will make all kinds of superimpositions of electronic and biological systems possible.
2030-2035
Creation of a computer model of the brain and human consciousness with the subsequent development of means to transfer individual consciousness onto an artificial carrier. This development will profoundly change the world, it will not only give everyone the possibility of cybernetic immortality but will also create a friendly artificial intelligence, expand human capabilities and provide opportunities for ordinary people to restore or modify their own brain multiple times. The final result at this stage can be a real revolution in the understanding of human nature that will completely change the human and technical prospects for humanity.
2045
This is the time when substance-independent minds will receive new bodies with capacities far exceeding those of ordinary humans. A new era for humanity will arrive! Changes will occur in all spheres of human activity – energy generation, transportation, politics, medicine, psychology, sciences, and so on.
Today it is hard to imagine a future when bodies consisting of nanorobots will become affordable and capable of taking any form. It is also hard to imagine body holograms featuring controlled matter. One thing is clear however: humanity, for the first time in its history, will make a fully managed evolutionary transition and eventually become a new species. Moreover, prerequisites for a large-scale expansion into outer space will be created as well.
Key elements of the project in the future
• International social movement
• social network immortal.me
• charitable foundation "Global Future 2045" (Foundation 2045)
• scientific research centre "Immortality"
• business incubator
• University of "Immortality"
• annual award for contribution to the realization of the project of "Immortality”.
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