Recent Event Highlights: HONDA ASIMO, third robot war, Second robot war, robot war, Stanford Arm. , robot arm, and 29 more...
Created by Abbey1 on Nov 16, 2008
Last updated: 03/05/10 at 10:30 PM
Robots has no followers yet. Be the first one to follow.
Jan. 4th - After six minutes of holding our breath (during EDL) as it burned and bounced its way to the red planet the robot rover Spirit lands on Mars.
SONY releases the AIBO ERS-7 it's 3rd generation robotic pet.
June 10th - NASA launches the MER-A "Spirit" rover destined for Mars. July 7th - NASA launches the MER-B "Opportunity"
Honda's ASIMO robot rings the opening bell at the New York Stock Exchange
LEGO releases the MINDSTORMS Ultimate Builder's Set
Honda debuts new humanoid robot ASIMO.
LEGO releases the MINDSTORMS Robotics Invention SystemTM 2.0
The Battlebots event is held in Las Vegas, Nevada.
LEGO releases The Robotics Discovery Set, Droid Developer Kit and the Robotics Invention System 1.5.
SONY releases the AIBO robotic pet.
LEGO releases their first Robotics Invention SystemTM 1.0. LEGO names the product line MINDSTORMS after Seymour Papert's seminal work of 1980.
The Pathfinder Mission lands on Mars. Its robotic rover Sojourner, rolls down a ramp and onto Martian soil in early July. It continues to broadcast data from the Martian surface until September.
The first node of the International Space Station is placed in orbit. Over the next several years more components will join it, including a robotic arm designed by Canadian company MD Robotics.
A RoboTuna is designed and built by David Barrett for his doctoral thesis at MIT. It is used to study the way fish swim.
The third annual Robot Wars event is held at Fort Mason Center, San Francisco, CA.
Honda debuts the P3, the fruit of its decade long effort to build a humanoid robot.
The second annual Robot Wars event is held at Fort Mason Center, San Francisco, CA.
Marc Thorpe starts Robot Wars at Fort Mason center in San Francsico, CA.
Dante an 8-legged walking robot developed at Carnegie Mellon University descends into Mt. Erebrus, Antarctica. Its mission is to collect data from a harsh environment similar to what we might find on another planet. The mission fails when, after a short 20 foot decent, Dante's tether snaps dropping it into the crater.
In an attempt to build a radio controlled vaccuum cleaner Marc Thorpe has the to start a robot combat event.
Dr. John Adler came up with the concept of the CyberKnife a robot that images the patient with x-rays to look for a tumor and delivering a pre-planned dose of radiationto the tumor when found.
A walking robot named Genghis is unveiled by the Mobile Robots Group at MIT. It becomes known for the way it walks, popularly referred to as the "Genghis gait".
At MIT Rodney Brooks and A. M. Flynn publish the paper "Fast, Cheap and Out of Control: A Robot Invasion of the Solar System" in the Journal of the British Interplanetary Society. The paper changes rover research from building the one, big, expensive robot to building lots of little cheap ones. The paper also makes the of building a robot somewhat more accessible to the average person.
Honda begins a robot research program thats starts with the premise that the robot "should coexist and cooperate with human beings, by doing what a person cannot do and by cultivating a new dimension in mobility to ultimately benefit society."
LEGO and the MIT Media Lab colaborate to bring the first LEGO based educational products to market. LEGO tc Logo is used by in the of thousands of elementary school teachers.
Takeo Kanade builds the direct drive arm. It is the first to have motors installed directly into the joints of the arm. This change makes it faster and much more accurate than previous robotic arms.
Star Wars is released. George Lucas' movie about a universe governed by the force introduces watchers to R2-D2 and C-3PO. The movie creates the strongest image of a human future with robots since the 1960's and inspires a generation of researchers.
Shigeo Hirose designs the Soft Gripper at the Tokyo Institute of Technology. It is designed to wrap around an object in snake like fashion.
Victor Scheinman forms his own company and starts marketing the Silver Arm. It is capable of assembling small parts together using touch sensors
The film Silent Running is released starring Bruce Dern. Bruce's co-stars are three robot drones Huey, Dewey and Louie.
Stanford University produces the Stanford Cart. It is designed to be a line follower but can also be controlled from a computer via radio link.
Victor Scheinman, a Mechanical Engineering student working in the Stanford Artificial Intelligence Lab (SAIL) creates the Stanford Arm. The arm's design becomes a standard and is still influencing the design of robot arms today.
Richard Greenblatt writes, MacHack, a program that plays chess, in response to a recent article written by Hurbert Dreyfus where he suggests, as a critique to efforts in artificial intelligence, that a computer program could never beat him in a game of chess. When the program is finished and Dreyfus is invited to play the computer he leads for most of the game but ultimately loses in the end in a close match. Greenblatt's program would be the foundation for many future chess programs, ultimately culminating in Big Blue the chess program that beats chess Grand Master Gary Kasparov.
The Stanford Research Institute (later to be known as SRI Technology) creates Shakey the first mobile robot to know and react to its own actions. Amongst other achievements SRI was also the research institute that helped bring us modern day laundry detergent in the development of Tide.
An artificial intelligence program named ELIZA is created at MIT by Joseph Weizenbaum. ELIZA functions as a computer psychologist that manipulates its users statements to form questions. Weizenbaum is disturbed at how quickly people put faith in his little program.
The first industrial arm robot - the Unimate - is introduced. It is designed to complete repetitive or dangerous tasks on a General Motors assembly line.
Heinrich Ernst develops the MH-1, a computer operated mechanical hand at MIT.
John McCarthy and Marvin Minsky start the Artificial Intelligence Laboratory at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT).
Alan Turing publishes Computing Machinery and Intelligence in which he proposes a test to determine whether or not a machine has gained the power to think for itself. It becomes known as the "Turing Test".
George Devol patents a playback device for controlling machines.
Issac Asimov produces a series of short stories about robots starting with "A Strange Playfellow" (later renamed "Robbie") for Super Science Stories magazine. The story is about a robot and its affection for a child that it is bound to protect. Over the next 10 years he produces more stories about robots that are eventually recompiled into the volume "I, Robot" in 1950.Asimov is generally credited with the popularization of the term "Robotics" which was first mentioned in his story "Runaround" in 1942. But probably Issac Asimov's most important contribution to the history of the robot is the creation of his Three Laws of Robotics: 1. A robot may not injure a human being, or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm. 2. A robot must obey the orders given it by human beings except where such orders would conflict with the First Law. 3. A robot must protect its own existence as long as such protection does not conflict with the First or Second Law. Asimov later adds a "zeroth law" to the list: Zeroth law: A robot may not injure humanity, or, through inaction, allow humanity to come to harm. issac asimov was a science fiction writer but the rules make sence so a lot of people use the laws.
The word robot is introduced.
Nikola Tesla builds and demonstrates a remote controlled robot boat at Madison Square Garden.
Josheph builds an automated loom that is controlled with punched cards. Punch cards are later used as an input method for some of the 20th centuries earliest computers.
Jacques de Vaucanson begins building automata in Grenoble, France. He builds three in all. His first was the flute player that could play twelve songs. This was closely followed by his second automaton that played a flute and a drum or tambourine, but by far his third was the most famous of them all. The mechanical duck. The duck moved, quacked, flapped it's wings and even ate and digested food.
Leonardo DaVinci designs a mechanical device that looks like an armored knight. The mechanisms inside "Leonardo's robot" are designed to make the knight move as if there was a real person inside. Inventors in medieval times often built machines like "Leonardo's robot" to amuse royalty.
Update Sources