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Flesh and Machines: How Robots Will Change Us
Antitechnologists may shudder at the story line, but readers interested in the astounding possibilities of the digital age will be fascinated by Brooks's vision of what is and what will be.
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Robotic Work Crew
Behaviours and Cooperation
 
Robotic Work Crew

Spaceflight has a brilliant article (thanks James) about a team of robots developped by Nasa: Robotic Construction Crew Rolls up Its Sleeves. Essentially, each worker bot has a set of reactive behaviours, which allow it do perform well on its own, for small objects. However, the interesting part is the development of robot networks, who communicate among each other. They can combine their behaviours to perform large tasks that they could not have done otherwise. It seems this is done by a democratic-like process, whereby the robots vote for actions. They constantly exchange information about their state so that the others can adapt to that fact.

This is great stuff, and it's actually working! That's a bit step in robotics, as theory won't get you too far ;) Anyway, this technology will have great impact when it comes to preparing the surface of Mars for humans... in another 50 years?

935 posts.
Thursday 24 January, 16:53
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