Can you code a mean Java hack? Are you into Robosapien V2? Will you be in Johannesburg in May?If so, then consider joining in the Robosapien programming contest at Sun Tech Days. Using Starship System's Java SDK, participants will compete on getting their robots to do, well, cool things. And what i…
Tom Atwood, over at Robot Magazine, has put a review of the Robotis Bioloid "edutainment" robot kit on their website. You can also find more information on Robotis' website, though, be warned that it's a Korean company and the "English" version is a bit confusing. ROBOT Magazine recently took a clo…
This morning I awoke to find an email in my inbox from LEGO. The email says: To thank you for your interest in the Developer Program, LEGO Shop at Home is giving you the exclusive opportunity to reserve your LEGO MINDSTORMS NXT ste today - before pre-orders are available to the public! And by …
A partnership between WowWee Toys and Evolution Robotics was just announced today. You can read the official press release here. The release says that WowWee will be incorporating some of Evolution's technologies, specifically their Visual Pattern Recognition (ViPR) software and their localization …
Jim Kelly, over at our favorite LEGO Mindstorms NXT blog, The NXT Step, is putting together a "shopping list" of questions that folks have about Mindstorms NXT and the Mindstorms Development Program (MDP). Jim is one of the lucky few that actually made it into the program. However, the MDPers are u…
Next time your in the mood for Sicilian archaeology, and you're in the vicinity of the Agrigento's Regional Archaeological Museum, ask Cicerobot for a tour. This 1.5m tall (5ft) robot gives guided tours of the museum. On board sensors allow him to autonomously navigate and avoid obstacles and peop…
A group of researchers at Rice University and the University of Southern California are working on creating a power source that is run off of bacteria that spits out electrons. The Shewanella oneidensis microorganism consumes metal and produces a waste product of electrons. In a fuel cell, th…
Researchers at the University of Texas have created artificial muscles that are 100 times more powerful that human muscles. The two different types of muscles both consume Oxygen and release the energy in hydrogen and alcohol to do work. One version converts the chemical energy into heat which cont…
Via the LEGO Mindstorms NXT press room: Place your orders! Beginning Saturday, April 1, you can place an advance order to guarantee receipt of one of the highly anticipated new LEGO MINDSTORMS NXT sets when they release in August. A limited quantity of NXT toolsets will be available for pre-order …
It looks like Spirit, one of the Mars rovers, has gotten itself in a bad situation. It's exploring an interesting feature on Mars called "Home Plate", but the Martian winter is coming on, which means low temperatures and low light levels. Scientists would love to say and continue explorin…
Now you can put large robotic koi in your fish pond instead of the real things. The folks at Ryomei Engineering have created a robotic carp that can swim like the real thing, along with going backwards, and turning in place. Here's some video of the fish in action. It has a camera in its head for g…
Well folks, I'm getting behind. Apologies. So, here's some yummy links to get your weekend started right.Here's Phillip Torrone and Co using a Roomba to play frogger, with unhappy results.Lots of great robot menace goodness at BoingBoing. (translation: kids in robot costumes and other goodies).Thou…
Check out this amazing video of an amphibious snake-like robot, the ACM-R5. Unfortunately, the video is in Japanese, but there's lots of great camera shots. Powered by a lithium-ion battery, the ACM-R5 is a radio-controlled amphibious robot designed to move like its real world counterpart. It can s…
The Air Force no longer wants Boeings X-45 unmanned airplane. The Joint Unmanned Combat Air Systems program has been scrapped by the Pentagon, along with the $800 million set aside to build and purchase three of the X-45Cs. Boeing will now probably try and compete against the Northrop Grumman X-47 …
Earlier this week, Hitachi captured the attention of the Blogosphere with its 'new' security robot. Not so fast, says MobileRobots. Apparently, Hitachi's robot is simply a repackaged Pioneer DX. "The wheel rims are the giveaway. The Pioneer DX systems sold a few years ago had unique gold wheel…
There is a video on New Scientist that shows a robot climbing a tree and other vertical surfaces. This is from the RiSE initiative, a descendent of the BR MURI project. BR MURI, Biomimetic Robots Multi-University Research Initiative, focused on building legged robots that ran. The goal of RiSE, Rob…
