New robot to work alongside humans

You've seen them alongside humans in movies, but rarely do we see robots among humans in real life. Recent technological advances mean that has changed.

UWS has recently acquired Baxter, a humanoid-looking robot designed to be affordable, safe, flexible and capable of working among humans, freeing them to complete other tasks. Baxter is particularly good at completing repetitive tasks.

At UWS, Baxter will be used both for research and teaching.

Baxter was designed and made by a company called Rethink Robotics in America. Its founder is Rodney Brooks, an Australian-born roboticist who also worked as a Professor of Robotics at Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

"Baxter is different to other industrial robots due to its compliant nature and its programming method," says Gu Fang, Associate Professor within the School of Computing, Engineering and Mathematics. "Baxter is compliant, which means it is safe to work amongst human workers without needing to be caged."

Baxter can be 'trained' by the less technically minded – you can demonstrate by moving Baxter's arms, which have sensors and cameras, to show Baxter how to do something and it will record and play back, repeating the job, without any programming. "On the flip side, a lot of programming is required by engineers to make Baxter user-friendly – and that's where research at UWS comes into play," says Gu.

Baxter has compliant arms and force detection so that it knows how much force it is exerting in which direction, allowing it to adapt to environments. It uses its cameras and sensors to 'see' and 'feel' irregularities, and guide parts into place. It can also decide if and when to perform each step it has been programmed to do.

"We are excited to have Baxter on board to interact with human workers and do a lot of fun activities," says Gu.

More information about the Baxter robot can be found on the Rethink Robotics website (opens in a new window).