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The bionic skin to help robots feel
Meet the team behind the 3D-printed stretchable sensors equipping machines with a sense of touch.
Robots can’t feel. Or can they? Engineering researchers at the University of Minnesota have developed a revolutionary process for 3D printing a stretchable electronic fabric and it’s allowing robots to experience tactile sensation. We reached out to University of Minnesota mechanical engineering associate professor and lead researcher on the study, Michael McAlpine, to find out how the super sensors work.
McAlpine is no stranger to Red Bull or 3D printing. He first achieved international acclaim for integrating electronics and 3D-printed nanomaterials to create a ‘bionic ear’ designed to hear radio frequencies beyond human capability, and featured in our 20 Mightiest Minds on Earth edition of The Red Bulletin way back in 2012. Now he’s tackling a new sense, touch, and his bionic skin may just save lives.
“Putting this type of ‘bionic skin’ on surgical robots would give surgeons the ability to actually feel during minimally invasive surgeries, which would make surgery easier and more precise instead of just using cameras like they do now. These sensors could also make it easier for other robots to walk and interact with their environment,” McAlpine says.
In a further melding of man and machine, future sensors could be printed directly onto human skin for purposes of health monitoring or to protect soldiers in the field from dangerous chemicals or explosives – the ultimate in wearable tech.
“While we haven’t printed on human skin yet, we were able to print on the curved surface of a model hand using our technique,” McAlpine says. “We also interfaced a printed device with the skin and were surprised that the device was so sensitive that it could detect your pulse in real time.”
The applications are pretty impressive, but how exactly does it work? Well, as you might imagine, it’s not your standard 3D printer.
New technology could print directly on human skin© Shuang-Zhuang Guo and Michael McAlpine, University of Minnesota
Conventional 3D printing using liquid plastic is too rigid and hot to print on skin, so McAlpine and his team print their unique sensing material using a one-of-a-kind printer they built in the lab. The multifunctional printer has four nozzles to print the various specialised 'inks' that make up the layers of the device – a base layer of silicone, top and bottom electrodes made of a conducting ink, a coil-shaped pressure sensor and a sacrificial layer that holds the top layer in place while it sets. The supporting sacrificial layer is later washed away in the final manufacturing process.
All the 'inks' used in this process can set at room temperature and the 3D-printed sensors can stretch up to three times their original size.
“With most research, you discover something and then it needs to be scaled up. Sometimes it could be years before it ready for use,” McAlpine explains. “The nice thing about this 3D-printing tool is that the manufacturing is built right into the tool, so this is reality now. We’re starting to integrate these devices directly onto the human body now, and it’s going to completely revolutionise the way people think about 3D printing.”
Source: https://www.redbull.com/us-en/3d-printed-bionic-skin-interview
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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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