An Area of Technology that Interests me

      The technology behind robots is something that has been fascinating to many for a long time, and with movies like 'I, Robot' making humanoid servants seem like a sci-fi creation of the not-too-distant future, I decided to take a look at the steps that are being made today, not just by Honda's 'ASIMO', but by the programmers and visionaries behind the technology that makes these incredible machines run, jump and recognise objects. 

      One problem that is proving a tough nut to crack is the issue of sight and recognition. We are born with the ability to see, and from day one our brains learn to recognise the constant stream of electrical impulses being sent along the optic nerve, through the thalamus and into the occipital lobe. This information is then processed and sent on to different areas of the brain, so that an object can be recognised, by drawing on memory and reasoning. But the human brain works in a very different way to the brain of a robot.



      Just another step in the journey towards producing passable humanoid robots, 'NICO', the brain child of Justin Hart and Brian Scassellati from Yale University, is a robot who is learning to be self-aware. NICO can look in a mirror and recognise the reflection of his arm. It can use this information to find the exact position of the limb in space, with accuracy to the nearest centimetre. The next big challenge for NICO is passing the mirror test. This is a classic test used by researchers to see if animals are aware that the reflection they see in a mirror bears any relationship to their own body. It is performed by sedating an animal, then placing a patch of coloured ink on their face. If the animal is able to look in a mirror and recognise from the reflected image that it has a patch of ink on its own face, it is said to have passed the test.
      While older learning robots have been programmed to learn about their surroundings, NICO's primary objective is to learn about itself and how it affects the environment around it through moving its arms. This idea is inspired in part by the fields of developmental psychology and neuroscience. It is this self-awareness that allows NICO to recognise that objects seen in a mirror are reflections, and do not exist behind the mirror.

      While making a robot that can see, and have a certain level of self-awareness is impressive in and of itself, NICO’s designers have great plans for how to use this revolutionary ability to see. Once NICO has become properly aware of himself, he will be able to monitor his interactions with objects in his environment. In much the same way a baby develops, he will learn that once he is holding a block in his gripper it acts as an extension of himself. With this learning process in place NICO will hopefully learn to use tools and interact with his environment in order to achieve goals, thus reaching an even higher level of intelligence and making human kind yet another step closer to creating truly intelligent robots.

      While NICO certainly doesn't look anything like a human, it is still another step on the way to having robots walking around in our homes. An important note on NICO's self-awareness is his ability to interact with humans safely. If robots cannot recognise their arm as being their own, they could pose a danger to humans, as they will not be able to recognise fully where their own arm is in 3-dimensional space. And if a robots hand suddenly tries to occupy the same space as a human's body, it will effectively be hitting the human in order for this to happen.
      NICO is a small, yet important step, and while it is not as visually impressive as seeing Honda's ASIMO run across a stage or walk up a flight of stairs, it all adds up. With research like this taking place, the future where personal robots take out the bins, brush the floor and do the gardening might not be as far away as people think...
      These two articles definitely show that steps are being made in the right direction, and with each new piece of research being done we come a little closer to a world similar to the one depicted in 'I, Robot'. I just hope that this future becomes reality in my time on this increasingly technology driven planet.

Article from Yale University

Article from Kurzweilai