News – 机器人研究与发展

2022年10月14日2022年10月14日

Stanford researchers create robotic boot that helps people walk

Engineers at Stanford University have created a boot-like robotic exoskeleton that can increase walking speed and reduce walking effort in the real world outside of the lab. The team’s research was published in Nature.

The exoskeleton gives users personalized walking assistance, allowing people to walk 9% faster and use 17% less energy per distance traveled. The energy savings and speed boost that the exoskeleton provides is equivalent to taking off a 30-pound backpack, according to the team.

The goal is to help people with mobility impairments, especially older people, to more easily move throughout the world, and the Standford team believes that its technology will be ready for commercialization in the next few years.

Using a motor that works with calf muscles, the robotic boot gives wearers an extra push with every step. The push is personalized using a machine learning-based model that was trained through years of work with emulators, or large, immobile and expensive lab setups that can rapidly test how to best assist people.

Students and volunteers were hooked up to the exoskeleton emulators while researchers collected motion and energy expenditure data. This data helped the research team to understand how the way a person walks with the exoskeleton relates to how much energy they’re using. The team gained more details about the relative benefits of different kinds of assistance offered by the emulator, and used the information to inform a machine-learning model that the real-world exoskeleton now uses to adapt to each wearer.

To adapt to an individual’s unique way of walking, the exoskeleton will provide a slightly different pattern of assistance each time the user walks. The exoskeleton then measures the resulting motion so that the machine learning model can determine how to better assist the user the next time they walk. In total, it takes the exoskeleton about an hour to customize its support to a new user.

Moving forward, the Stanford researchers hope to test what the exoskeleton can do for its target demographic, older adults and people who are experiencing mobility decline from disability. The team also wants to plan design variations that target improving balance and reducing joint pain, and work with commercial partners to turn the device into a product.

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2022年4月19日2022年4月19日

United Robotics Group acquires SoftBank Robotics Europe

Trust is key to service robot design, says SoftBank Robotics

The Pepper humanoid service robot was designed to inspire trust. Source: SoftBank

United Robotics Group, a German distributor of service robots, is acquiring Softbank Robotics Europe. Financial details of the acquisition were not disclosed. Softbank Robotics Europe, which develops the Pepper and Nao robots, will revert to its original name, Aldebaran, which it used prior to being acquired by Softbank.

SoftBank will acquire a minority stake in United Robotics Group. The two companies will continue to cooperate in marketing robots. The transaction is subject to merger clearance and is expected to close in the second quarter of 2022. This deal was first reported to be in the works back in October 2021.

United has been the master distributor of Nao and Pepper in Europe since October 2021, responsible for sales, service and maintenance. It also distributes the Pudu service robot, Boston Dynamics’ Spot quadruped, the Sawyer collaborative robot arm and other robots. United is backed by Hahn, a major industrial automation player in Germany. Hahn acquired the IP for Rethink Robotics after the company shut down in 2018. Hahn has since relaunched Sawyer.

“We are pleased to welcome SBRE with more than 180 exceptionally motivated robotics specialists,” said Thomas Hähn, founder and CEO of United Robotics Group. “This is an important step for us on the way to further internationalizing our company. The future Aldebaran with their strong reputation in the market will help us to further expand our great potential in combining interaction robotics with our knowledge in collaborative industrial robotics.”

Fumihide Tomizawa, President & CEO, SoftBank Robotics Group, said: “We are strengthening our strategic partnerships with various robotics leader companies around the world. We are very pleased to form a strong partnership with a successful company, URG. We will leverage this great relationship to develop and market Pepper and a variety of other robots.”

It’s been a rocky few years for Softbank Robotics Europe and the Pepper humanoid. Reuters reported in June 2021 that Softbank stopped production of Pepper in 2020 and has fewer than 2,000 units left. According to Reuters, SoftBank planned to end sales of new Pepper units in 2023 at the latest. Sales of refurbished units will continue after this point, Reuters reported.

United Robotics Group distributes (left to right) Pepper, Sawyer, Double 3, Nao and Temi. It also distributes Boston Dynamics’ Spot.

It’s unclear at the moment if United Robotics Group and Aldebaran will restart manufacturing of new Pepper units. The Robot Report reached out to the companies and will update this story if new details emerge.

Pepper has been a money-losing proposition since it was introduced. Softbank Robotics Europe, which was acquired by Softbank for $100 million in 2012, lost $38 million in its fiscal 2019-2020 year and more than $119 million over the last three years.

In June 2021, Softbank Robotics Europe laid off 40% of its employees in Paris. An employee, who wished to remain anonymous, told The Robot Report at the time that “the market for Nao and Pepper is smaller than we expected.” The source also said Softbank wouldn’t be focusing on the Nao and Pepper robots much going forward.

It’s been clear for a while that both Nao and Pepper weren’t going to be a major part of Softbank’s robotics strategy going forward. In January 2021, for example, it was announced that Softbank Robotics will jointly develop robots with Japanese electronics maker Iris Ohyama. The joint venture, called Iris Robotics, never mentions Nao or Pepper.

The Whiz cleaning robot is Softbank’s new flagship robot, according to a source. Softbank has made other changes to its robotics strategy, most notably offloading 80% of its ownership stake in Boston Dynamics to Hyundai for $880 million. It also paid $2.8 billion for a 40% ownership stake in AutoStore, a leading developer of automated storage and retrieval systems (AS/RS), that debuted earlier this week on the Oslo Stock Exchange. AutoStore currently has a global blue-chip customer base with more than 600 installations and 20,000 robots across 35 countries.

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2022年4月13日2022年4月13日

ROS 2 now available on Clearpath Robotics’ Husky UGV

Clearpath Robotics’ Husky UGV is an all-terrain mobile robot development platform. | Source: Clearpath Robotics

Editor’s Note: Brian Gerkey, co-founder and CEO of Open Robotics, is keynoting our Robotics Summit & Expo, which takes place May 10-11 in Boston. His talk, called “Robotics Needs a Babelfish: The Skinny on Robot Interoperability,” will discuss how companies are addressing interoperability, and what options are available to vendors, end users, and integrators. Attendees will learn about the history of Open-RMF (Robotics Middleware Framework), best practices for multiple vendor robot interoperability, and future interoperability trends.

Clearpath Robotics announced that ROS 2 is now available on its Husky unmanned ground vehicle (UGV). The UGV is a medium-sized robotic development platform popular among robotics researchers.

Husky is an all-terrain mobile robot that can be equipped with stereo cameras, LiDAR, GPS, IMUs and manipulators. The robot weighs in at 110 lbs, and has a payload capacity of 165 lbs. Its max speed is 2.2 MPH, and it can typically run for 3 hours on a single charge. According to Clearpath Robotics, Husky was the first field robotics platform to support ROS from its factory settings.

Husky was also one of the first robots outside of Willow Garage, a robotics research lab that developed ROS until Open Robotics was founded in 2012, to offer official ROS support. ROS 2 improves upon ROS 1, and makes it able to be used in more unique use cases, such as multi-robot teams, small embedded systems and non-ideal networks.

Clearpath and Open Robotics have a history of collaborating on mobile robot platforms. The two companies collaborated on the TurtleBot 4, the next generation of the popular open-source mobile robotics platform. TurtleBot 4 aims to build on the success of previous versions by providing a low-cost, fully extensible, ROS-enabled reference platform for robotics researchers, developers, and educators.

Open Robotics recently celebrated its 10 year anniversary. On March 22nd, 2012 it officially incorporated the Open Source Robotics Foundation.

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2022年4月13日

iRobot launches Create 3 educational robot

iRobot Create 3 educational robot. | Credit: iRobot

In celebration of National Robotics Week, iRobot today launched the Create 3 educational robot. Based on the Roomba i3 Series robot vacuum platform, Create 3 is a mobile robot development platform for advanced makers who are learning ROS 2.

Create 3 is available in the US ($299) and Canada ($399) now. It will be available in EMEA through authorized distributors in the coming months.

Create 3 doesn’t have vacuuming capabilities, but it offers a boatload of other features to advance one’s robotics knowledge. It comes pre-assembled and equipped with Wi-Fi, Ethernet-over-USB host, and Bluetooth. It also features an inertial measurement unit (IMU), optical floor tracking sensor, wheel encoders, and infrared sensors for autonomous localization, navigation, and telepresence applications. It also includes cliff, bump and slip detection, along with LED lights and a speaker.

Using the built-in USB-C port, you can attach and run third-party hardware on Create 3. With Create 3, you can build basic mobile robot applications or explore advanced applications including multi-robot exploration, navigation and mapping technology, and telepresence capabilities.

“iRobot is committed to delivering STEM tools to all levels of the educational community, empowering the next generation of engineers, scientists and enthusiasts to do more,” said Colin Angle, chairman and CEO of iRobot. “The advanced capabilities we’ve made available on Create 3 enable higher-level students, educators and developers to be in the driver’s seat of robotics exploration, allowing them to one day discover new ways for robots to benefit society.”

iRobot released a Python Web Playground for Create 3, along with its Root educational robot. iRobot said this provides a bridge for beginners to start learning more advanced programming skills outside of the iRobot Coding App. Python is a common coding language and enables users to broaden the complexity of their projects.

A 3D simulation of Create 3 is also available using Ignition Gazebo for increased access to robotics education and research.

The launch of Create 3 coincides with National Robotics Week, which runs April 2-10. Founded and organized by iRobot, National Robotics Week is a time to inspire students about robotics and STEM-related fields, and to share the excitement of robotics with audiences of all ages through a range of in-person and virtual events.

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2022年4月13日2022年4月13日

This robotic beehive wants to save the bees

Beewise’s BeeHome is a robotic beehive that can reduce bee deaths and increase honey yields. | Source: Beewise

Every year, around 35% of all bee colonies on the planet collapse, according to Beewise CEO Saar Safra. This is a phenomenon called colony collapse disorder, and it occurs when worker bees abandon the colony and queen.

Stopping this decline is crucial. Seventy five percent of all fruits, vegetables, seeds and nuts we consume relies on pollination from bees. Beewise, a company with offices in California and Israel that recently raised $80 million, is hoping to save those bees from collapse and other threats by reinventing technology that’s more than 150 years old – the modern beehive.

“We want to reverse the trend,” Safra said. “We don’t only want to stop colony collapse, we want to reverse the trend and start increasing populations of bees on the planet to the levels they used to be.”

Inside BeeHome

BeeHome automatically prevents swarming and harvests honey using artificial intelligence. | Source: Beewise

Beewise’s solution is a robotic beehive called BeeHome. It is solar powered and can autonomously care for hives of bees. The home keeps pests away, automatically harvests honey, attends to the bees’ health and can even prevent swarming. This is a process in which a single colony splits into two or more distinct colonies.

BeeHome can hold up to 24 beehives and contains a robotic system that tends to the needs of bees. Bees can leave from either side of the box, while the robotic system sits in the center.

“The robot monitors and identifies the bees’ needs in real time using artificial intelligence and computer vision,” Safra said. “For example, if it’s November and there’s no foliage, there’s no flowers. There’s no source of nectar and pollen for the bees, and the robot will take some food from within the device’s containers and feed the bees.”

Beyond providing food and water for the bees, BeeHome can deter pests. According to Safra, one of the biggest pests bee keepers are working to deter today are varroa mites. Varroa mites are similar to ticks, they latch themselves to the bees and infect them with viruses. The mites are typically handled with pesticides.

“We’re the only solution on the planet today that allows treatment of varroas without chemicals,” Safra said. “We use heat treatment. Essentially, we head up the brood frames without the bees in them, and we head them to a certain temperature that doesn’t hurt the brood, doesn’t hurt the larva of the bees, but actually kills the pest.”

Beewise’s impact

According to Safra, BeeHomes only see 8% colony collapse a year, reducing overall bee mortality by 80%. On average, beekeepers are able to harvest 60% more honey from BeeHomes than traditional beekeeping boxes.

Typically, beekeepers will allow bees to accumulate honey during heavy honey flow seasons. At the end of the honey flow season, usually two to three months long, the beekeepers harvest the honey. Beekeepers typically manage hundreds of hives, and don’t have the time to check on each of them individually to see if they have enough honey to harvest.

BeeHome can give each frame inside the structure attention. This means it doesn’t have to wait for an entire colony to produce a lot of honey. Instead, BeeHome automatically harvests each frame when it’s full. When the frame fills with honey, it gives a signal to BeeHome, which then begins harvesting the honey.

“There’s an internal centrifuge, which turns very quickly. There’s a protocol of how long it needs to turn the frame,” Safra said. “Essentially, the robot uncaps the frame so that the honey will be free to flow, puts it in the centrifuge, the centrifuge turns for about eight to 15 minutes, depending on how sticky the honey is. Then the honey is collected in a big container, and that frame is being put back to work in the colony to gather more honey right away.”

Beewise’s unique approach to saving the bees is what attracted investors like Insight Partners, the lead investor on the company’s most recent Series C round. Fortissimo Capital, Corner Ventures, lool ventures, Atooro Fund, Meitav Dash Investments and Sanad Abu Dhabi also participated in the round.

“We have a lot to do,” Safra said. “We need to lower our colony collapse numbers significantly, we need to spread and distribute this device.”

Safra also said the company was working on further developing the device and hiring on new talent.

The post This robotic beehive wants to save the bees appeared first on The Robot Report.

2022年1月25日2022年1月25日

How 11 cobots help assemble the Fiat 500 electric car

UR Cobots FIAT 500

Stellantis N.V. is a Dutch multinational automobile manufacturer established through a merger between PSA and Fiat Chrysler Automobiles. The company installed 11 collaborative robot arms from Universal Robots (UR) at its Mirafiori factory in Turin, Italy, to automate a series of complex assembly line operations and quality controls for the new Fiat 500 electric car.

The collaborative applications developed at Mirafiori have delivered significant benefits in terms of operating precision and quality, and also improved the ergonomics of a series of operations previously performed manually.

Challenge

On the Fiat 500 electric car production line, some of the assembly processes and quality controls required the introduction of specific automation technologies to ensure the quality and repeatability needed to meet product standards. Additionally, given the fairly high average age of the factory workers, the question of ergonomic well-being was also an issue.

Solution

Stellantis decided to adopt UR cobots robots some years ago. Collaborative automation has freed operators from repetitive and physically demanding manual tasks, so that they can be employed on processes with greater added value.

The 11 UR cobots now automate the following applications:

Application of the waterproof liner to the vehicle doors (2 UR10e cobots working in parallel)
Positioning of the soft-top (activation of the primer track and visual inspection to ensure the correct extrusion of the adhesive band around the perimeter) (1 UR10e)
Check on soft-top frame dimensions (1 UR10e)
Riveting of the tailgate with blind rivets press-set on the boot frame (1 UR10e)
Hood mounting (1 UR10)
Tightening of the rear side-door hinges (1 UR10)
Mudguard mounting (2 UR5 and 2 UR10 cobots)

The UR cobots at the Mirafiori factory were rolled out gradually to enable the operators to fully understand how the automated processes worked.

“As a first step, we decided to introduce a UR cobot in the company canteen, distributing glasses of water to employees during the lunch break,” Mirafiori plant manager Luigi Barbieri said. “This gave the line workers the opportunity to see the safety and collaborative nature of the cobots for themselves, and overcome any apprehensions about the safety of the subsequent applications.”

Results

After the success of this initial trial, the UR cobots were installed on a series of applications on the 500 electric car production line:

Application of the waterproof liner to the vehicle doors: Two UR10e cobots operate in parallel on the door assembly line. A vision system registers the arrival of the door and activates the cobot, which uses a roller attached to its wrist to apply constant pressure on the fabric, applying it on the door panel.

The application is particularly challenging because it requires the cobot to follow a complex path within a confined space, avoiding the panel’s push pin protrusions and ensuring that the liner is completely sealed to prevent the infiltration of water. The cobots work with millimetric precision, guaranteeing a repeatability of +/- 0.05 mm.

“The UR cobot has significantly improved the ergonomics of this application,” said ergonomics specialist Giuseppe Guidone. “The application of the liner required the operator to apply constant pressure using a dynamometric roller, a task that over the long term could damage the arm joints and cause musculoskeletal disease. So the cobot has brought two benefits: high operating precision and quality, along with improved ergonomics and well-being for our operators.”

A UR10e cobot uses a roller attached to its wrist to apply the fabric to the door panel. | Credit: Universal Robots

Soft-top assembly
Two UR10e cobots operate on the soft-top assembly line for the Fiat cabrio 500 model. The first cobot performs two different operations; Using a pad supported by a special pick-up device, the UR10e cleans and prepares the primer track, on which the adhesive to fix the soft-top to the frame is subsequently applied. The second operation is a quality control, where a vision system checks the geometric continuity and dimensions of the adhesive band. The second cobot works in synergy with an anthropomorphic robot.

Once the soft-top has been assembled, it is opened on a special support and then picked up by the robot. At this point, the second UR cobot runs a size check (through a vision system) on the soft-top frame to ensure the conformity of the dimensions. Once conformity has been ascertained, the soft-top is removed from the line by the anthropomorphic robot.

This application offers a series of productivity and quality advantages. The cobots ensure that the adhesive extrusion is correct and check the dimensions of the soft-top frame.

Tailgate riveting
On the door assembly line for the Fiat 500 electric car, a UR10e cobot has been configured to press-set 10 blind pop rivets, which secure the boot hinge reinforcements to the boot frame. The operator loads the tailgate frame and hinge reinforcements onto the workstation, then leaves the cobot to position and press-set the rivets.

The application provides productivity and ergonomic benefits. At the same time, constant monitoring of the workstation input and output parameters ensures higher and consistent process quality.

Hood mounting
For this application, the car body reaches the workstation with the hood mounted in a closed position and the hinge screws inserted by the operators on the previous station. Once the hood geometry has been established, the cobot (a UR10) moves into position and tightens the 4 screws to the correct torque.

The main advantages of this application are quality, efficiency and ergonomics, given that the hood reaches the station in a closed position, making correct tightening extremely difficult. Since the hinge screws to be tightened are not visible, the operator could easily miss one or make an incorrect tightening. The cobot also improves the ergonomics of the operation, freeing the operators from working in uncomfortable or awkward positions.

Two UR5 and two UR10s cobots are installed on a platform that lowers itself on  the z axis in relation to the body. The wings of the platform close to fix the geometry and  activate the tightening operation on the 24 screws that fasten the mudguards. | Credit: Universal Robots

Extra door hinge tightening
For the Fiat 500 model featuring an extra rear side door, an automated application capable of performing a complex tightening cycle was required. With the assistance of an advanced automated tool on which the cobot is installed, the door is positioned correctly on the vehicle body. The cobot then performs the tightening operations, from the rear of the boot.

The cobot meets two different process requirements: it frees the operator from tightening the hinges in an awkward posture, where they would be unable to see the correct positions inside the car body; and it prevents the kickback from the tightening tool (which operates with a 75 Nm torque) hitting the arm of the operator.

Mudguard mounting
In this station on the sheet metal line, the frame arrives with the right and left mudguards already in position. Two UR5 and two UR10s cobots are installed on a platform that lowers itself on the z axis in relation to the body. The wings of the platform close to fix the geometry and activate the tightening operation on the 24 screws that fasten the mudguards. Each of the 4 cobots is fitted with an automatic screw gun with torque control.

The application offers various advantages. Collaborative automation guarantees ergonomic benefits for the operators (who are no longer required to work below the vehicle body). Since the screws are torque tightened, tensile stress on the sheet metal parts is eliminated. Also, the cycle time is shortened, boosting the productivity of the whole station.

The post How 11 cobots help assemble the Fiat 500 electric car appeared first on The Robot Report.

标签：News

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