Related topics: artificial intelligence
Robot
hideRobot is a virtual or mechanical artificial agent. In practice, it is usually an electro-mechanical system which, by its appearance or movements, conveys a sense that it has intent or agency of its own. The word robot can refer to both physical robots and virtual software agents, but the latter are usually referred to as bots. There is no consensus on which machines qualify as robots, but there is general agreement among experts and the public that robots tend to do some or all of the following: move around, operate a mechanical limb, sense and manipulate their environment, and exhibit intelligent behavior, especially behavior which mimics humans or other animals. In South Africa, robot is an informal and commonly used term for a set of traffic lights.
Stories of artificial helpers and companions and attempts to create them have a long history but fully autonomous machines only appeared in the 20th century. The first digitally operated and programmable robot, the Unimate, was installed in 1961 to lift hot pieces of metal from a die casting machine and stack them. Today, commercial and industrial robots are in widespread use performing jobs more cheaply or with greater accuracy and reliability than humans. They are also employed for jobs which are too dirty, dangerous or dull to be suitable for humans. Robots are widely used in manufacturing, assembly and packing, transport, earth and space exploration, surgery, weaponry, laboratory research, and mass production of consumer and industrial goods.
Modern robots are usually used in tightly controlled environments such as on assembly lines because they have difficulty responding to unexpected interference. Because of this, most humans rarely encounter robots. However, domestic robots for cleaning and maintenance are increasingly common in and around homes in developed countries, particularly in Japan. Robots can also be found in the military.
For more information about Robot, read the full article at
Wikipedia.
This text uses material from Wikipedia and is available under the GNU Free Documentation License.
News tagged with robot
Robots Reveal Insights into Evolution
Sep 16, 2009 |
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(PhysOrg.com) -- In an ironic twist to our understanding of life, robots may offer a greater degree of realism for studying some of the intricacies of natural selection and evolution than real organisms offer. ...
Researchers Hope to Mass-Produce Tiny Robots
Aug 28, 2009 |
4.8 / 5 (26) |
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(PhysOrg.com) -- Tiny robots the size of a flea could one day be mass-produced, churned out in swarms and programmed for a variety of applications, such as surveillance, micromanufacturing, medicine, cleaning, ...
Ski Robot Could Decipher the Art of Skiing
Jul 20, 2009 |
4.4 / 5 (8) |
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(PhysOrg.com) -- Watching an Olympic skier perform a downhill slalom, turning smoothly around the flags, makes the sport seem just as much an art as a science. Although advanced skiers know how to turn effectively, ...
Jellyfish Robot Swims Like its Biological Counterpart
Jun 26, 2009 |
4.4 / 5 (9) |
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(PhysOrg.com) -- "Jellyfish are one of the most awesome marine animals, doing a spectacular and psychedelic dance in water," explain engineers Sung-Weon Yeom and Il-Kwon Oh from Chonnam National University ...
Living Safely with Robots, Beyond Asimov's Laws
Jun 22, 2009 |
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(PhysOrg.com) -- "In 1981, a 37-year-old factory worker named Kenji Urada entered a restricted safety zone at a Kawasaki manufacturing plant to perform some maintenance on a robot. In his haste, he failed ...
Space Robot Can Autonomously Reconfigure Itself
Jun 15, 2009 |
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A robot designed to work in space should ideally be a Jack of all trades, with the ability to perform a wide variety of tasks by itself. By having one robot that can handle many jobs, astronauts can cut down ...
The Origin of Artificial Species: Creating Artificial Personalities
Technology / Computer Sciences
May 14, 2009 |
3.8 / 5 (10) |
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(PhysOrg.com) -- Does your robot seem to be acting a bit neurotic? Maybe it's just their personality. Recently, a team of researchers has designed computer-coded genomes for artificial creatures in which a ...
It's All Relative: UCSD's Einstein Robot Has 'Emotional Intelligence' (Video)
Feb 13, 2009 |
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(PhysOrg.com) -- Albert Einstein may have written his last scientific theory more than half a century ago, but he's still honing his emotional intelligence in a laboratory at the University of California, ...
Cyclogyro Flying Robot Improves its Angles of Attack
Jan 22, 2009 |
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(PhysOrg.com) -- In the past few decades, researchers have been investigating a variety of flying machines. Most studies have focused on improving the flying performance of standard flying mechanisms, rather ...
Robots Detect Behavioral Cues to Follow Humans
Aug 21, 2008 |
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Robots can be ironic. Even though they might not have emotions of their own, they can still detect and respond to humans’ emotions. A recent study has shown that, by picking up on human emotional traits, as ...
Eureqa, the robot scientist (w/ Video)
Technology / Computer Sciences
Dec 07, 2009 |
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(PhysOrg.com) -- A new program, Eureqa, takes raw data and formulates scientific laws to suit, and it is available by free download to all scientists.
Musical robots perform duets (w/ Video)
Nov 26, 2009 |
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(PhysOrg.com) -- A flute playing robot unveiled by Waseda University last year has been joined by a robot saxophonist in a Classical music duet. The aim of the project was to design robots that could respond ...
Success in 'space elevator' competition (Update 3)
Space & Earth / Space Exploration
Nov 05, 2009 |
4.3 / 5 (36) |
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(AP) -- A robot powered by a ground-based laser beam climbed a long cable dangling from a helicopter on Wednesday to qualify for prize money in a $2 million competition to test the potential reality of the ...
Robot Armada Might Scale New Worlds
Space & Earth / Space Exploration
Oct 28, 2009 |
4.3 / 5 (11) |
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(PhysOrg.com) -- An armada of robots may one day fly above the mountain tops of Saturn's moon Titan, cross its vast dunes and sail in its liquid lakes.
New robot skier takes to the slopes (w/ Video)
Oct 23, 2009 |
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(PhysOrg.com) -- A new robot skier has been invented that can be fitted with off-the-shelf skis. This is not the first skiing robot, since Japanese scientists have produced their own (see PhysOrg.com article here), but is bigger and heavie ...
