Robotics

This ain't teleoperation. Chinese researchers have tested a new, much quicker and easier method of teaching robots to play tennis, and the results look like a breakthrough in machine learning and real-world AI.

Texas Instruments has teamed up with NVIDIA to link technologies designed to "accelerate the path from simulation to the safe deployment of humanoid robots in the real world." The partnership fuses real-world sensing tech with massive computing power.

If someone asked you to move like a robot and you responded with the fluid art of ballet, your audience would be baffled, yet technically, you would be right. Robots are famous for their characteristic rigid movement, which is useful in some applications but can hinder adaptability. Now, researchers have developed a robotic wing that moves like no other.

BMW is expanding its investigation of humanoid robotic workers at its factories. The automaker has just announced that it will trial a set of physical AI bots made by Hexagon for the first time at one of its European plants.

Less than two years since it was founded, San Francisco-based startup Weave Robotics is accepting pre-orders for its first home robot, which promises to do one thing well: fold your laundry. But it might still need remote human help.

Researchers have developed an electronic skin that allows humanoid robots to distinguish everyday touch from damaging force. That ability, once reserved for living nervous systems, could reshape how robots interact with the physical world and with humans.

Shanghai robotics startup DroidUp has launched what it calls "a beautifully designed and expressive bionic robot" that is touted as "the world's first highly bionic robot that deeply integrates human aesthetics and advanced humanoid movement."

Boston Dynamics has unveiled the new Atlas, a humanoid designed as a practical industrial tool for warehouses and factories. Atlas can operate 24/7 in extreme temperatures, and uses AI to adapt to its environment. Production has already started.

LG has debuted a home robot that's designed to cook, clean, and manage chores using advanced Physical AI. Part of LG's "Zero Labor Home" vision, the wheeled humanoid features dexterous hands and visual learning to automate daily household tasks.

The new “stingraybot” from a team at ETH Zurich (the Federal Institute of Technology of Switzerland) offers enormous promise for surgery, medical care, wildlife biology, robotics, and more, thanks to muscular membranes of microbubbles.

Although they're constantly improving, robots aren't necessarily known for their gentle touch. A new robotic system from MIT and Stanford takes a unique stab at changing that, with a robot that uses vine-like tendrils to do its lifting.

Hangzhou is the latest city in China to take traffic control to a new level, rolling out its AI-powered robot police officer to direct vehicles and pedestrians at major intersections and issue polite warnings to law-breakers.

Georgia Tech takes vision for soft robots to the next level with PHySL, a biomimetic photo-responsive hydrogel soft lens that focuses using light alone. It does away with electronics, wires, bulk, and the dangers of breaking.

A startup founded by MIT alumni wants robots to do some heavy lifting, literally. Pickle Robot Company's systems feature AI smarts and single-armed machines to quickly unload shipping containers filled with cases weighing up to 50 lb each.

When the Iron humanoid was unveiled to the public, strutting fluidly down the runway before a gobsmacked crowd, it made headlines – but not for the reasons its creators hoped. The robot moved so humanlike that people were sure there was someone inside it.