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Oculus Rift and Robotic Heads: A Match Made In Geek Heaven
Like its namesake, DORA was born to explore. Specifically, the robot—which was built by a team of students at the University of Pennsylvania—is designed to be a kind of exploration surrogate, able to move its head with the same speed and flexibility as the human seeing through its eyes. DORA's movements are mapped to an Oculus Rift virtual reality headset, so when the goggle-wearer swivels left, the robot follows suit. It provides something seemingly unprecedented in robotics: telepresence from the neck up.
In fact, that's pretty much all DORA, or Dextrous Observational Roving Automaton, can do. It's a robotic bust mounted on a four-wheeled, battery-powered cart, so it can navigate itself through environments. But mobility isn't the focus of this research project. “This is about recreating the experience of being in another place,” says John Nappo, an undergraduate roboticist at UPenn. “We thought, How do we capture this in as realistic a way as possible?”
DORA's primary mission is to breath life into consumer-grade telepresence robots, a class of machines that are little more than webcams on wheels. Companies like Double Robotics and iRobot offer telepresence models that upgrade the telecommuting experience—employees can remotely swing by a cubicle or conference room, rather than simply joining via speakerphone. These are not immersive systems, however. The robots' operators watch video from a single camera, and often have to reposition their surrogates entire awkward body in order to see who in the room just piped up, or to pick up the subtle, nonverbal social cues that enrich human interaction.
Of course, you don't see most telepresence bots outside of office or work environments, because they're only barely useful in the highly structured world of corridors and cubicles. If a physically disabled operator wanted to check out a museum exhibit, for example, today's robots do a worse job of transporting the user than a smartphone-based Skype connection. This is the largely boring, and unsophisticated state of consumer telepresence.
DORA, at least on paper, is different. Never mind the robot's mobility. It's the bust that matters, and the machine's makers imagine DORA-like systems planted in places that deserve to be viewed as if you actually there. Stick one in the Sistine Chapel, and remote visitors could get some sense of the work's grandeur, and without the distorted, stitched-together view that Google's Street View cameras (and similar systems) provide. Along with perfectly mirroring the way a human moves his or her head while perceiving the world, the robot's dual cameras mimick our stereoscopic vision. The user sees in 3D, and not just the clumsy layers of flat, paper doll-like images that Hollywood often passes off as 3D. “You can see the rounded edges and curvatures of cables, for example,” says Nappo.
DORA, in other words, could be useful for applications other than sightseeing. Tasks that require fine, precise perception and manipulation could benefit from a swiveling, stereoscopic-visioned robot head. “We didn't built the prototype to handle this, but we can see it being used in first response,” says Peter Zachares, a mechanical engineer at UPenn. From bomb disposal to emergency triage, Zachares believes DORA could help “wherever the user needs to be up close and personal.”
In fact, it's hard to come up with a kind of teleoperated robot that wouldn't benefit from a fast-swiveling robotic head. From armed drones and military ground bots to the walking, humanoid disaster responders in DARPA's upcoming Robotics Challenge, the ability to at least occasionally strap on an Oculus Rift and take a remote look around could be more useful than an entire suite of sensors.
Nappo, Zachares and two fellow students have been working on DORA for the past year, and it's been selected as one of 20 robots that will compete in next week's Intel-Cornell Cup in Cape Canaveral, Florida. The top prize at the student research competition is $10,000. But whether or not the robot takes home any cash, the event will give DORA its biggest stage yet. With enough funding, Nappo believes that DORA could be commercialized in around two years, with units priced at roughly $2000 each. That's cheap enough for robotic heads to actually start showing up at tourist attractions, in conference rooms, and on other bots. If the Oculus Rift becomes the game-changer that so many analysts expect it to be, VR-controlled robots won't be far behind.
Source: http://www.popsci.com/oculus-rift-and-robotic-heads-match-made-geek-heaven-0
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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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