As 2009 comes to a close it's time once again for the Robot Christmas Gift List! We're featuring a few of the same, but mostly new, things since the 2008 Robot Christmas Gift Guide. We'll be featuring 10 items that would make great gifts for the robot lover in your life. Prices range from $10 to $9…
Reuters via DailyKos President Obama, in remarks today about the importance of a solid education in Science and Math, tipped his hand on national defense - National defense against ROBOTS. Apparently he's aware of the potential for an upcoming robopocalypse, saying: I believe that robotics
Sci-Fi blog io9 has put together an epic list of pop-culture Cyborgs through the ages. Explore the evolution of the cinema cyborg from the pre-60's to present day. Who's your favorite? My vote is with Summer Glau as Cameron, but I'm still pretty bitter over Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles…
Basically I just printed out one of these (laser printer recommended):...And attached it to a wheel (double sided tape recommended). Then I hooked up one of these (a 2$ IR sensor: QRB1134):...And attached it to the motor pointing towards the wheel. I've been testing it a bit with a few lines of Ard…
  A couple of weeks ago we reported on Jon Hyland's NanoSeeker Micro AUV project. Today Jon posted some more details on his project and he seems to be making rapid progress. With the help of a rapid prototype machine there are now working prototypes of the vehicles in the water. The NanoSeeker
Finally, I can send and receive messages between the ardbot and my pc, over bluetooth. This post on the Arduino forum was very helpful:http://www.arduino.cc/cgi-bin/yabb2/YaBB.pl?num=1231650517Here's my code in its preliminary state. The idea will be to transmit a short string of characters from th…
Boilerplate, the fictional robot created by artist Paul Guinan, now has a robolicious coffee-table book called Boilerplate: History's Mechanical Marvel. Featuring historic scenes from the 19th and 20th century, we see Boilerplate's military prowess as he fights along-side military giants like T…
MEDbot is good for what ails you | The Brothers Brick | LEGO Blog.
I'm constantly reminded of my shortcomings as a blogger, especially with this story, as I don't think I've ever posted about Vecna's BEAR, or Battlefield Extraction-Assist Robot. Regardless, the BEAR is a "humanoid" (well, it has a face and arms) robot that is designed to lift, carry, and extract…
  Robot lovers, start saving for airfare to Korea, because you're gonna want to be there for RobotLand. "Fun and fantasy with robot". We've covered the robot mecca before when it was still in early concept phase, but things seem to be humming along for a 2012 grand opening. The centerpie
Jon Hylands, on his blog this week, posted a link to his NanoSeeker Micro AUV project. The vehicle is 6 inches long and 1.25 inches in diameter. That's tiny! Jon plans to outfit the AUV with a 6 DOF IMU, a compass, depth sensor and an ARM based microcontroller. You can see some pictures of the
Well I now have received my first arduino (duemilanova), having used PICAXEs for a few years, but have a problem.I do not have internet at home, where I do the programming, and cannot find a printable version of the arduino language manual (if there is one!). I download a couple of basic 'beginn
To support my idea for building a 360 degree range finder, I want to build my own slip ring assembly.I'm thinking of using a copper clad board to create concentric rings. I found a manufacturer that uses this technique. I posted a picture from them below. The lower ring provides the brush contacts
Cornell University has won the 12th annual AUVSI Autonomous Underwater Vehicle Competition. And, according to Cornell's tweet, second place goes to University of Victoria and 3rd to University of Rhode Island. Interestingly, these three teams weren't even in the top 5 of last year's compeitors (pd…
AUVSI and ONR's 12th Annual International Autonomous Underwater Vehicle Competition starts up tomorrow (July 30th), with two days of prelimiary runs and testing, followed by 2 days of competition this weekend. Last year's winner, University of Maryland, along with 29 other teams are signed up to …
I'm a sucker for great looking robot art. This piece, by Jason Chan really stood out. The 'robot' tag at vi.sualize.us is a great place to find such art. Stone Master And The Girl | Illustration Art | The Design Inspiration.
