Robotics
Boosting AI learning speed with UNREAL agent
At Google's DeepMind, a team has made AI inroads in speed and performance. The researchers behind the effort have put out a paper describing the maneuvers and the paper is on arXiv, titled "Reinforcement learning with unsupervised auxiliary tasks." Authors are Max Jaderberg, Volodymyr Mnih, Wojciech Marian Czarnecki, Tom Schaul, Joel Leibo, David Silver and Koray Kavukcuoglu, of DeepMind, London.
Internet robot investigates human creativity
Tom White, senior lecturer in Victoria's School of Design, has created Smilevector—a bot that examines images of people, then adds or removes smiles to their faces. "It has examined hundreds of thousands of faces to learn the difference between images, by finding relations and reapplying them," says Mr White. "When the computer finds an image it looks to identify if the person is smiling or not. If there isn't a smile, it adds one...
The latest standard in robotics
On the wall of Aaron Dollar's office is a poster for R.U.R. (Rossum's Universal Robots), the 1920 Czech play that gave us the word "robot." The story ends with the nominal robots seizing control of the factory of their origin and then wiping out nearly all of humanity. Dollar, fortunately, has something more cheerful in mind for the future of human-robot relations. He sees them as helpers in our daily lives—performing tasks like settin...
Drones and insect biobots map disaster areas
Researchers at North Carolina State University have developed a combination of software and hardware that will allow them to use unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) and insect cyborgs, or biobots, to map large, unfamiliar areas – such as collapsed buildings after a disaster.
Top tips for a career in robotics
Precision gearing specialist Harmonic Drive UK has released a one-page guide giving advice for those interested in a career in robotics. The guide details the different routes that people can take to work in the sector, routes that depart from traditional robot manufacturing. Despite the engineering skills shortage, there are still many jobs available in various areas of the robotics industry.
UK's Robotics week returning
A range of robotic activities and challenges, that are open to schools, industry sectors and academic institutions, also known as UK Robotics Week 2017 has officially been launched. These activities culminate in a national week of celebration being held 24th – 30th June 2017.
The return of the UK Robotics Week
A range of robotics activities and challenges have opened to schools, academic institutions and industry sectors with the launch of UK Robotics Week 2017. These activities culminate in a national week of celebration being held 24th to 30th June 2017. The second annual UK Robotics Week is set to be even bigger and better, building on the success of the inaugural event.
Remote-controlled drone helps design wireless networks
Aerial photographs and photogrammetry together provide an accurate 3D model, which improves the prediction of the propagation of radio waves at millimetre-wave frequencies. The development of mobile devices has set increasingly high requirements for wireless networks and the emission of radio frequencies.
How to ethically design your robot
In The Matrix, a lack of robot ethics leads to the destruction of the human race, with robots enslaving humans in a simulated reality. Despite it being a prolific cinematic theme, robot ethics has not been discussed much in industry until now. However, the most recent technological advancements in the field have led to the introduction of a new UK standard for robot designers.
Drone-based inspection software can access confined spaces
A partnership has been set up between Sky-Futures and Flyability to bring to market a fully integrated solution for drone-based industrial inspection. The Flyability Elios is a collision-tolerant drone allowing access to complex and confined spaces where manned entry is not possible or desirable.