Hardware Podcasts

Jenga robot creator reviews chess-playing robot flaws

The Robot Report Podcast · 29 Jul 2022 · 49m

What this episode covers

Nima Fazeli, assistant professor of robotics at the University of Michigan and creator of a Jenga-playing robot at MIT, analyzes the chess-playing robot incident in Russia that broke a child's finger, attributing the failure to the use of an industrial arm without safety compliance and a primitive vision system. Fazeli explains that the robot likely mistook the child's finger for a chess piece due to a lack of tactile feedback and proper collaborative robot (cobot) design, such as impedance control or robot skin. The hosts also discuss Rice University's 'necrobotics' research using dead wolf spiders as grippers, Teradyne's strong Q2 robotics revenue driven by Universal Robots, and Locust Robotics achieving SOC 2 certification for its cloud-based AMR fleet management.

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University of Michigan, MIT, Rice University, Teradyne, Universal Robots, Locust Robotics, Agility Robotics, DHL, Waymo, Amazon, Boston Dynamics, Cybernetic Ventures, Mass Robotics, In Orbit, Neurolink, TRI, APFL, Taiwan Industrial Technology Research Institute

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