This is Tech

• Monkey controls robot with mind (Via Gadget for Life)
• Robots and mongooses team up to detect landmines. (Via Hacked Gadgets)
• NewScientist put together a great video of robots inspired by animals (check out the video below for robotic salamanders, fish, and wall-walking geckos)

The BBC News posted an interesting article this morning about an automated restaurant concept in Germany. Patrons order from touch screens and their food is delivered on a complex rail structure. Does away with waiters. Looks like a bit of a gimmick, but if I were in Germany I would give it a try. Check out the video at the BBC site.

(Via BBC News.)

Robotics, making the world a better place, one smart dog at a time.

This dog is awesome. Found this video on Brent Evans’ Geek Tonic.

(Via Make and Geek Tonic.)

Trossen Robotics has annouced the winners in its February robotics comptition. The winner is a unique hexapod robot called “Phoenix,” created by Kåre Halvorsen

Phoenix is one the creepier robots I have seen lately. Creepy in the, can’t look away sense. It is amazing what is possible with off the shelf hardware and some ingenuity. Congratulations to Halvorsen. For pictures and information on the runners up, check out TRC’s winners page. [Note: the TRC Winners Page is currently down. Hopefully this will change soon]

From the Trossen Robotics Site:

“Phoenix” by Kåre Halvorsen took the win in the TRC February run. Phoenix is a six legged walking robot. Wait, we know some of you out there may be thinking that hexapod robots are old hat. Well, you’re wrong. So very wrong. Wait until you see it move. Phoenix’s real beauty lies in her graceful motion, which is some of the most convincing and eerily lifelike that we’ve seen in a robot that uses standard hobby servos and a common off-the-shelf servo controller. The kinematics are computed by an intricately programmed spreadsheet, which we highly recommend you check out if you’re a fan of trigonometry.”

Slashdot posted a story this week about an open source robot project from a start-up called Willow Garage in the Bay Area. The company is working on an open hardware platform for researchers and tinkerers to build on. In order for large groups of people to contribute to a robotics project, it helps to have everyone working on the same hardware. Excerpt from the original article at Network World below:

Open source robot: your next personal assistant - Network World: “Open source robot: your next personal assistant
Start-up Willow Garage aims to make robotics useful to everyday life
By Jon Brodkin , Network World , 03/06/2008

Imagine a robot that hands you a beer and then cleans your kitchen and living room. That’s what a start-up called Willow Garage in Menlo Park, Calif., is busy developing. But the company isn’t going it alone: Willow Garage is an open source project that wants as much outside participation as possible.

One of its immediate goals is to build 10 robots and make them available to university researchers as a common platform that can be tinkered with and improved. Willow Garage will also supply ‘an open-source code base integrated from the best open-source robotics software available,’ President and CEO Steve Cousins said Wednesday at the O’Reilly ETech conference on emerging technology in San Diego”

(Via Network World.)