There鈥檚 nothing quite like the human touch. Nimble-fingered robots that exactly mimic the movements of a human hand could soon be used to help decommission nuclear power stations.
Remote-controlled robots with hand-like manipulators are used in many situations that are difficult or dangerous for humans, such as bomb disposal. However, their movements are typically controlled by human operators via joysticks, which limits their dexterity.
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To address this, Miika Per盲 and Hamid Reza Zaheri at London firm have built a system that lets robotic arms and hands emulate hand movements exactly.
https://vimeo.com/155381213
To guide the robot, a human carries out the desired actions either in front of a video camera or while wearing a glove that captures movement. The system, which works for a range of existing robot hands, mimics the movements as the human makes them (see video above).
The robot鈥檚 movements are often even more fluid than the human鈥檚 since the software smoothes out sudden or jerky actions made by the human demonstrator.
Robotic hands with human-like dexterity are needed in environments where it is difficult 鈥� or impossible 鈥� for humans to work, says Per盲. For example, he notes that there are hundreds of remotely operated robots used by the oil and gas industry in the North Sea. Nimble fingers could also be useful in the textile industry, where making delicate clothes is still difficult for robots.
But the first to benefit may be the nuclear industry. Cambrian Intelligence hopes to develop its system for use at , a British company that decommissions nuclear power stations.
鈥淲e just can鈥檛 handle certain facilities and materials with human beings,鈥� says Tom Robinson, a researcher at Sellafield. 鈥淭he radiation levels are too high.鈥�
The idea would be to send in a robot, while a human operator wearing a virtual reality headset moved the robot arm as if it were their own, says Per盲. Robinson thinks robotic arms could then be used for delicate tasks like handling samples and chemical analyses.
Cambrian Intelligence is now working on a system that goes beyond merely mimicking a human, to using its dexterity in novel situations. 鈥淵ou can just show the robot how to unscrew something,鈥� says Per盲. 鈥淎fter the robot has learned the action, it can do that action again on its own.鈥�
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