Image credit: wata1219 on flickr (CC BY-NC-ND 2.0)
Would you like to learn how to tell your robotics/AI story to the public? Robohub and AIhub are testing a new workshop to train you as the next generation of communicators. You will learn to quickly create your story and shape it to any format, from short tweets to blog posts and beyond. In addition, you will learn how to communicate about robotics/AI in a realistic way (avoiding the hype), and will receive tips from top communicators, science journalists and ealy career researchers. If you feel like being part of our beta testers, join this free workshop to experience how much impact science communication can have on your professional journey!
The workshop is taking place on Friday the 30th of April, 10am-12.30pm (UK time) via Zoom. Please, sign up by sending an email to daniel.carrillozapata@robohub.org.
Do you fancy making yourself an industrial robot to enjoy at home? Jeremy Fielding, a passionate fan of mechanical engineering, did. So he built one. Good news is: he’s preparing a series of videos to teach you the whole process from scratch. How much power do you need to run 7 motors at one time? If you lose power, how do you prevent the arm from collapsing on you or dropping the load? How do you keep the cost down? He’s recorded over 100 hours of video, and he’s planning to teach you how he used the servo motors, how you can use them for your projects and how he designed his 7 axis, articulated robot.
Jeremy’s aim (website, YouTube, Twitter, Instagram) is simple: draw people to engineering with amazing projects, inspire them with ideas, then teach them how to do it. And for this video series, he’s also looking for your collaboration. So if you’ve got experience and knowledge on building this type of robots and you’d like to share it, maybe you end up being part of the series!
We’d like to thank Black in Robotics for making it possible for us to discover Jeremy. Here’s the video Jeremy has released to introduce his project:
Even massive events like the 54th edition of Consumer Electronics Show (CES) have gone virtual due to the current pandemic. Since 1967, the Consumer Technology Association (CTA), which is the North American trade association for the consumer technology industry, has been organising the fair, and this year was not going to be any different—well, except they had to take the almost 300,000m${}^2$ from CES 2020 to the cloud. In this post, I mainly put the focus on current and future hardware/robotics trends presented at CES 2021 (because we all love to make predictions, even during uncertain times).
“Innovation accelerates and bunches up during economic downturns only to be unleashed as the economy begins to recover, ushering in powerful waves of technological change”—Christopher Freeman, British Economist. With this quote, I start the first session on ‘my show’ of CES 2021, ‘Tech trends to watch’ by CTA (see their slides here). There are not-that-surprising trends such as Artificial Intelligence/Machine Learning or services like cloud computing, video streaming or remote learning, but let’s kick off with hardware/robotics. Steve Koenig (Vice President of Research for CTA) highlighted this recent study from Gartner that predicts Robotic Process Automation will become a \$2 billion global industry in 2021, and will continue growing with double figures through 2024.
Dual Arm Robot System (DARS) from ITRI
Lesley Rorhbaugh (Director of Research for CTA) also presented some other hardware/robotics trends for 2021, including digital health wearables going beyond your wrists (for example, the Oura ring can measure your body temperature or respiratory rate, and generate a health score based on the data collected during the day, making it a potential tool to detect early COVID-19 symptoms) or robot triage helpers to support during high influx of patients at hospitals and to reduce the exposure rate of hospital workers. We all know this past year has been marked by COVID-19. In a more focused session on ‘robots to the rescue’ chaired by Eugene Demaitre (Senior Editor at the Robot Report), he stated that “this year, the definition of what a frontline worker is has changed”. In fact, the field of rescue robots has expanded with the current pandemic. Not only are they applied to assist in disaster situations nowadays, but areas such as autonomous delivery of goods, automatic cleaning for indoor sanitising (such as ADIBOT) or even cooking (such as the kitchen robot by Moley)—as Lesley showed in her session.
ADIBOT from UBTECHKitchen robot by Moley
“Delivery is actually the largest unautomated industry in the world”, Ahti Heinla (CEO of Starship Technologies) said. “From the consumers’ perspective, delivery today kind of works. You pay a couple bucks and you get what you want, or maybe you don’t pay these couple of bucks at all. It appears to be free. Well, guess what? It isn’t free, and while it might be working for the consumer, it isn’t always working for the company doing the delivery. They are looking for solutions.”
Delivery robot by Startship Technologies
What’s more, there’s a shortage of drivers to cope with the exponential growth of deliveries, Kathy Winter (Vice President at the IoT group at Intel) mentioned. But automation comes with a price, and the management of autonomous delivery fleets isn’t straightforwards. In relation to drone delivery, James Burgess (CEO of Wing) said that “data is one of the key elements here. There’s so much to keep track of, both individual robots or airplanes as you have, but also the environment, the weather, the traffic, the other systems that are moving through.” One of the biggest challenges is to actually develop the platform that manages the fleets. But also, “you need to build hardware, build software, think about regulations, think about safety, think about the consumer adoption and value proposition. You also need to build an app”, Ahti expressed. When it comes to regulations (whether traffic regulations for autonomous vehicles or standards for safety on sidewalks), the technology is far more advanced, Kathy said. In her opinion, we need a common standard that certifies safety of autonomous ground/aerial vehicles to avoid having different safety levels depending on the vehicle.
Delivery drone by Wing
As in recent years at CES, vehicle tech takes a huge part of the whole event. With the rise of 5G connectivity (expected to really kick off during 2021), not only are self-driving cars in the trends conversation, but also connectivity via Cellular V2X (Vehicle to Everything communication). This is especially remarkable, as the area of smart cities is also a current trend in development under the umbrella of the Internet of Things.
Hans Vestberg’s keynote at CES 2021 (CEO of Verizon)
As shown above, research into consumer habits and future technology trends is a huge part of the work that CTA does. Some preexisting tech has skyrocketed as a result of the current health crisis, as CTA’s latest research reveals. Indeed, the tech industry grew by 5.5% to \$442 billions during 2020 in the United States.
5-year tech trends forecast by CTA
While hardware-related tech—which represents three quarters of the industry retail value—had a flat growth, services grew by a substantial 31%. It is not surprising that the overall five key trends including hardware, software and services that CTA found are: 1) remote learning (educational robots, AR/VR, STEM products), 2) digital entertainment (e.g. audio/video platforms or gaming), 3) smart homes (tech to improve energy efficiency, air/water quality, etc.), 4) online shopping (as exemplified above, autonomous grocery delivery is becoming a thing), and 5) personal vehicles & travel tech (did I mention autonomous vehicles already?). When it comes to their hardware forecast, their prediction for the short run points to smart homes technology (with home robots being a very popular choice) and digital health, an area worth \$845 millions, with a great opportunity for health-monitoring devices (e.g. wearables).
Handy bot by Samsung
Dallara IL-15 racecar, the autonomous car designed for the Indy Autonomous Challenge in October, 2021
There was also room at CES 2021 for diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI). In the session chaired by Tiffany Moore (Senior Vice President, Political and Industry Affairs at CTA), invited speakers Dawn Jones (Acting Chief Diversity and Inclusion Officer & Global Director of Social Impact communications, policy and strategy at Intel) and Monica Poindexter (Head of Employee Relations and Inclusion & Diversity at Lyft) commented on the findings from the reports on diversity, inclusion and racial equity launched recently by Intel and Lyft. As stressed by both Dawn and Monica, retention and progression of employees from underrepresented groups is key for successful DEI in the long run. In fact, it can take at least one or two years before the outcome of DEI policies start to show up, Monica pointed out. Another crucial aspect both speakers shared is the support from the C-suite and middle managers. They all have to believe in the same DEI goals across the organisation. Active listening and the implementation of mechanisms for bottom-up feedback where employees can anonymously express their opinion and raise their concerns have also helped both companies improve their DEI. However, the two reports show there are still DEI barriers to break down (e.g. no more than 21.3% were females at senior, directors or executive levels at Intel in 2020, and there was an overall loss of 1.9% of the Black/African American employees at Lyft last year). That is why the work done by organisations such as Women in Robotics and Blacks in Robotics is vital to improve DEI inside companies. Still, a lot of work to be done.
Let’s hope #CES2022 returns to Las Vegas (because this will mean the pandemic is over). See you there!
Finishing this series of CYBATHLON 2020 winners, today we feature the victory of the startup Circleg from Switzerland. We also had the chance to interview them (see the end of this post).
In this race, pilots wearing a leg prosthesis from five teams had to complete a circuit using any kind of active/passive prosthesis. In the CYBATHLON organisers’ own words, “passive prostheses are primarily for cosmetic purposes and have few functional characteristics. So-called active leg prostheses can be controlled accurately thanks to innovative technologies. After a leg amputation, motorised prostheses allow users to do things like climb stairs more easily and walk up and down sloped surfaces successfully.” The challenge for the pilots was to complete the following tasks:
(1) Balancing cups and plates while sitting down and standing up to test leg strength in a confined space.
(2) Overcoming hurdles while carrying apples on two plates from one end to the other to test their bending ability and movement control of the knee joints.
(3) Transporting two buckets on a beam to test their ability to balance while moving forwards and backwards.
(4) Transporting balls and boxes to the other side of the stairs with only one foot on each step to test their ability to bend the knee joint, the motor power on the stairs, the precision of steps, their stability, all with limited vision.
(5) Crossing a tilted path in both directions while carrying plates with apples to test the bending ability and angle control of the knee and ankle joint.
(6) Balancing a plate with apples while ascending and descending a ramp to test the ability to bend knee and ankle joints, and their bending stability and motor power at the ramps.
Powered leg prosthesis race tasks
As with other disciplines, the top three races were very tight. Team Circleg with pilot Andre Frei completed the circuit in 2m 43s, giving them the gold medal. Only five extra seconds did take the Swiss silver medalist team, NeuroLegs with pilot Stefan Poth. The bronze medal went to the Polish team Contur 2000 with pilot Adrian Bak, finishing the race in 2m 57s. Here’s a summary of the races of the top 4 finalists:
You can see the results from the rest of the teams in this discipline here, or watch the recorded livestreams of both days on their website.
Interview to Simon Oschwald – Co-founder of Circleg
Simon Oschwald (left) and Fabian Engel (right), co-founders of Circleg
D. C. Z.: What does it mean for your team to have won in your CYBATHLON category?
S.O.: To win the prosthetic leg race at the Cybathlon exceeded all our expectations! Participating in the Cybathlon was a huge milestone for our team and a great opportunity to present the Circleg and our vision on this global stage. It was important for us to be able to show that the Circleg, with its functionality, can support amputees for the various challenges they face in everyday life. Our pilot Andre has now definitely proven this by winning the Cybhatlon race! The performance of the Circleg at the Cybathlon 2020 is also a confirmation that we are on the right track with the development to ultimately achieve our vision of Freedom of Mobility for everyone. We are thrilled!
D. C. Z.: And what does it mean for people with disabilities?
S.O.: I hope that many Amputees worldwide will see the performance of the Circleg at the Cybathlon as a sign that even with limited financial means it is possible to achieve freedom of mobility. Together we can realize with Circleg a holistic and sustainable prosthetic care for the majority of amputees worldwide. See it as a promise from our side that we will give everything to turn this vision into reality!
D. C. Z.: What are still your challenges?
S.O.: There are quite a few: The transformation of Circleg Zero into a mass product, the development of the local production chain and, finally, the implementation of our business model. A sustainable prosthetic supply does not only consist of a functioning product, but also requires locally functioning production, high-quality support, repair and service facilities and appropriate financing mechanisms. With the Circleg we address all these issues an our interdisciplinary is extremely motivated to tackle these challenges!
Did you manage to watch all the holiday robot videos of 2020? If you did but are still hungry for more, I have prepared this compilation of Science Magazine videos featuring robotics research that were released during last year. Enjoy!
These ‘beetlebots’ keep flying, even after crashing into poles
What if the folding wings of beetles could help robots navigate narrow places by not being affected by crashes? You can read a bit more here, and see the research article here.
Magnetic spray transforms inanimate objects into mini-robots
Researchers developed an iron-based spray that sticks to surfaces like origami paper or cotton thread, and turns objects into tiny robots that could be maneuvered inside our bodies for future biomedical applications. You can read a bit more here, and see the research article here.
Speedy drones count Antarctic penguin colonies in record time
Reducing the amount of time that it takes to count penguins in Antarctica is crucial when you have to survive its extreme weather conditions. Researchers developed a new algorithm for multiple drones that cut the time from two days to three hours. You can read the story here.
Mosquito-inspired drone dodges obstacles, thanks to air-pressure sensors
By taking inspiration from the way some mosquitoes use changes in air flow to detect close objects, researchers created a sensor that can be fitted into flying robots to avoid crashes even when objects can’t be seen in the dark. You can read a bit more here, and see the research article here.
How NASA’s new rover will search for signs of ancient life on Mars
On 18 February, 2021, a NASA’s rover launched last summer will land on Mars to help researchers understand the planet’s climatic history. You can read the story here.
These sweaty robots cool themselves faster than humans
Cooling systems are important for robots in the same way they are for us. Indeed, researchers were inspired by the human best cooling system: sweat. You can read a bit more here, and see the research article here.
Swarm of drones flies through heavy forest—while staying in formation
Maintaining connectivity while avoiding crashes during outdoor navigation is a difficult challenge for robots flying through forests. Researchers found the way to ease this task. You can read a bit more here, and see the research article here.
It’s Saturday, it’s the turn of another post of the James Bruton focus series, and it’s Boxing Day in the UK and most of the Commonwealth countries. Even if this holiday has nothing to do with boxing, I didn’t want to miss the opportunity to take it literally and bring you a project in which James teamed up with final year degree students in Computer Games Technology at Portsmouth University to build a robot that fights a human in a Virtual Reality (VR) game.
For this project, the students Michael (Coding & VR Hardware), Stephen (Character Design & Animation), George (Environment Art) and Boyan (Character Design & Animation) designed a VR combat game in which you fight another character. James’ addition was to design a real robot that fights the player, so that when they get hit in the game, they also get hit in real life by the robot. The robot and the player’s costume are tracked using Vive trackers so the VR system knows where to position each of them in the 3D virtual environment. You can see some artwork and more details about the project here and here. Without further ado, here’s James’ video:
In continuation to this series of CYBATHLON 2020 winners, today we feature the victory of PULSE Racing from VU University Amsterdam. We also had the chance to interview them (see the end of this post).
In this race, pilots with paraplegia from nine teams competed against each other using a recumbent bicycle that they could pedal with the help of functional electrical stimulation (FES) of their leg muscles. As the organizers of CYBATHLON describe, “FES is a technique that allows paralysed muscles to move again. By placing electrodes on the skin or implanting them, currents are applied to the muscles, making them contract. Thus, a person whose nerves from the brain to the leg muscles are disconnected due to a spinal cord injury (SCI) can use an intelligent control device to initiate a movement, e.g. stepping on a bike pedal. New types of electrodes and an exact control of the currents make it possible to maximise the pedal force with each rotation while avoiding early muscle fatigue.” Pilots had 8 minutes to complete 1200m on their static recumbent bike.
Functional electrical stimulation bike race illustration
Five out of the nine teams finished the 1200m race. Therefore, the podium was decided based on finishing time, with pilot Sander Koomen from the winning team PULSE Racing (The Netherlands) completing the distance in 2 minutes and 40 seconds (that’s an average speed of 27km/h). The silver medal went to team ImperialBerkel (UK & The Netherlands) with pilot Johnny Beer, who made a time of 2 minutes and 59 seconds. Finally, team Cleveland (US) with pilot Mark Steven Muhn won the bronze medal with a finishing time of 3 minutes and 13 seconds. You can watch a summary of the top 4 races in the video below.
You can also see the results from the rest of the teams in this discipline here, or watch the recorded livestreams of both days on their website.
Interview to PULSE Racing
Team PULSE Racing
D. C. Z.: What does it mean for your team to have won in your CYBATHLON category?
P.R.: We saw this as a good reflection of where we stand as a team. The result was unexpected, because sometimes it is hard to see results during training. By winning the Cybathlon, our uncertainties about our developments vanished. The golden medal emphasizes our strength and motivation as a student team. Our dream, winning the Cybathlon on the first attempt, came true. We are thankful that the Cybathlon gave us the opportunity to participate, which helped us to gain publicity.
D. C. Z.: And what does it mean for people with disabilities?
P.R.: It means that with joining our team, people with a disability are able to keep developing their bodies and mind, according to a training scheme. This improves mental well-being and health. Besides that they can still be part of the society, and become more confident.
D. C. Z.: What are still your challenges?
P.R.: In the coming years we want to focus more on the mechanics of the bike, to see if we can make some improvements. And it would be great if this form of exercise is accessible for more people with a spinal cord injury. For that it is important that more people are aware of the possibilities of Functional Electrostimulation (FES).
You can follow team updates on Instragram (#pulse.racingnl) and Facebook/LinkedIN (#pulseracing).
As every other Saturday, I’m bringing you another cool open-source project from James Bruton. Today, how about becoming an experimental musician with your own barcode scanner synthesizer?
I introduced James Bruton in the first post of this focus series on him, where I showed you the Boston Dynamics-inspired open robot dogs projects that consolidated him as one of the top maker on YouTube. As a sort of musician, the barcode synth project I’ve picked for this second post grabbed my attention among the countless videos he’s got on his channel.
To be more specific, the barcode synth consists of two projects. A bit more than a year ago, James showed how to build a four-neck guitar synth with the frets (the place where you put your fingers to play a note on the guitar) being barcodes instead of strings. To play this guitar, you only need a barcode reader connected to an Arduino that converts the data read from the barcodes into a number that represents a MIDI note – which is a digital representation of a musical note based on the MIDI standard. You can then plug the Arduino into a synth or your computer (if you love virtual instruments as much as I do!) to transform the MIDI output into actual sound. Extra features of this guitar included pitch bending and octave shifting buttons. You can access the open-source code of this type of guitar here, and enjoy James’ explanation (and performance) in the following video:
A couple of months ago, James made an improved version of the previous guitar synth. Instead of using the number given by the barcode, for this improved synth he hacked the barcode reader to interpret the barcodes as images so that the output is the raw square wave that it sees. With he help of a Teensy microcontroller to do the digital signal processing and a Raspberry Pi to display barcode images on a screen fitted to a 3D-printed guitar, he could produce a richer range of sounds compared to the previous version. If you want to build you own barcode synth, check out the open-source files and his video (you’ll be impressed to find out how a zebra sounds like!):
In this race, pilots with a severe walking disability from seven teams competed against each other in a motorized wheelchair. As the organizers of CYBATHLON describe, “motorized wheelchairs can make everyday life much easier for people with a walking disability. The important thing is that they can overcome obstacles such as ramps and yet are not too large to drive under a normal table. Motorized wheelchairs that are controlled by joystick, tongue control, touchpad or other technologies are eligible for this race and are characterized by innovative approaches to overcome obstacles such as stairs”. The challenge for the pilots was to complete the following tasks:
(1) Driving up to a table until half of the thighs were covered without displacing the table to test the size and seat height of the wheelchair.
(2) Driving through furniture without displacing it to test the size of the wheelchair and precise maneuverability.
(3) Crossing uneven terrain to test the grip of the wheels, ground clearance and power.
(4) Ascending and descending stairs, and bringing the wheelchair to a standstill while descending to test the ability to climb and descend stairs in a controlled manner, and power.
(5) Driving across tilted path with different surfaces to test the drifting and tipping stability, and power.
(6) Driving a ramp up and down, opening and closing the door in the middle using an externally powered technical support (e.g. a robotic arm) to test precise maneuverability and control of technical support in a confined space.
Powered wheelchair race tasks
This year, team HSR Enhanced with pilot Florian Hauser was unbeatable again, as it happened in the 2016 edition. The silver medal went to team Caterwil from Russia with pilot Iurii Larin. The third finalist was team Fortississimo from Japan with pilot Hiroshi Nojima. Here’s a summary of the races of the top 4 finalists (from time 1:01:49):
You can see the results from the rest of the teams in this discipline here, or watch the recorded livestreams of both days on their website.
Interview to Christian Bermes – (ex) Team leader of HSR Enhanced team
We had the pleasure to interview Christian Bermes, team leader of the HSR Enhanced team in both 2016 and 2020 editions. After CYBATHLON 2020, he handed over the team leads, as he moved from OST to be Professor for Mobile Robotics at the University of Applied Sciences of the Grisons.
Christian Bermes – (ex) Team leader of HSR Enhanced team
D. C. Z.: What does it mean for your team to have won in your CYBATHLON category?
C.B.: It is a huge confirmation that our first win in 2016 was not just a coïncidence, but again the result of human-centered innovation together with our pilot Florian Hauser, meticulous engineering, proper prior planning, hard training and of course a next-level pilot performance. Needless to say that there was a certain amount of luck involved, too – and hard work puts you where luck finds you.
D. C. Z.: And what does it mean for people with disabilities?
C.B.: I find it hard to answer this in general terms. Our wheelchair as it is right now will not enter a mass market, however some of its modules could, if we found partners for industrialization. I just think it’s great that people with disabilities are the figureheads and heroes of CYBATHLON. They have prepared themselves in the most professional way, have unmatched control over their machines and are simply impressive.
D. C. Z.: What are still your challenges?
C.B.: Right now we enjoy the weightlessness of the win. Soon after, CYBATHLON will publish the new race obstaces for 2024 and I am 100% sure that there will be many technical challenges right away. Moreover, budget has to be secured, sponsors must be found, the team must be sworn in, plus many things more. The goal for 2024 is clear – win another title. I have full confidence in the new lead crew and their team, they will outperform everything we have seen from HSR enhanced until this day. And with Florian Hauser as pilot, we will see lightning speed on the race day.
The story of pilot Florian Hauser
The organizers released a series of videos telling the personal story of some of the competing pilots. The pilot of the HSR Enhanced team, Florian Hauser, “is a tetraplegic since he had a motorcycle accident in 2014. However, this does not prevent him from riding fast. Not on a bike anymore, but in his wheelchair,” as the organizers describe. Apart from being the winner of his discipline in this 2020 edition, Florian also won CYBATHLON 2016 and the CYBATHLON wheelchair Series in Japan.
In this race, pilots with a severe walking disability from seven teams competed against each other in a motorized wheelchair. As the organizers of CYBATHLON describe, “motorized wheelchairs can make everyday life much easier for people with a walking disability. The important thing is that they can overcome obstacles such as ramps and yet are not too large to drive under a normal table. Motorized wheelchairs that are controlled by joystick, tongue control, touchpad or other technologies are eligible for this race and are characterized by innovative approaches to overcome obstacles such as stairs”. The challenge for the pilots was to complete the following tasks:
(1) Driving up to a table until half of the thighs were covered without displacing the table to test the size and seat height of the wheelchair.
(2) Driving through furniture without displacing it to test the size of the wheelchair and precise maneuverability.
(3) Crossing uneven terrain to test the grip of the wheels, ground clearance and power.
(4) Ascending and descending stairs, and bringing the wheelchair to a standstill while descending to test the ability to climb and descend stairs in a controlled manner, and power.
(5) Driving across tilted path with different surfaces to test the drifting and tipping stability, and power.
(6) Driving a ramp up and down, opening and closing the door in the middle using an externally powered technical support (e.g. a robotic arm) to test precise maneuverability and control of technical support in a confined space.
Powered wheelchair race tasks
This year, team HSR Enhanced with pilot Florian Hauser was unbeatable again, as it happened in the 2016 edition. The silver medal went to team Caterwil from Russia with pilot Iurii Larin. The third finalist was team Fortississimo from Japan with pilot Hiroshi Nojima. Here’s a summary of the races of the top 4 finalists (from time 1:01:49):
You can see the results from the rest of the teams in this discipline here, or watch the recorded livestreams of both days on their website.
Interview to Christian Bermes – (ex) Team leader of HSR Enhanced team
We had the pleasure to interview Christian Bermes, team leader of the HSR Enhanced team in both 2016 and 2020 editions. After CYBATHLON 2020, he handed over the team leads, as he moved from OST to be Professor for Mobile Robotics at the University of Applied Sciences of the Grisons.
Christian Bermes – (ex) Team leader of HSR Enhanced team
D. C. Z.: What does it mean for your team to have won in your CYBATHLON category?
C.B.: It is a huge confirmation that our first win in 2016 was not just a coïncidence, but again the result of human-centered innovation together with our pilot Florian Hauser, meticulous engineering, proper prior planning, hard training and of course a next-level pilot performance. Needless to say that there was a certain amount of luck involved, too – and hard work puts you where luck finds you.
D. C. Z.: And what does it mean for people with disabilities?
C.B.: I find it hard to answer this in general terms. Our wheelchair as it is right now will not enter a mass market, however some of its modules could, if we found partners for industrialization. I just think it’s great that people with disabilities are the figureheads and heroes of CYBATHLON. They have prepared themselves in the most professional way, have unmatched control over their machines and are simply impressive.
D. C. Z.: What are still your challenges?
C.B.: Right now we enjoy the weightlessness of the win. Soon after, CYBATHLON will publish the new race obstaces for 2024 and I am 100% sure that there will be many technical challenges right away. Moreover, budget has to be secured, sponsors must be found, the team must be sworn in, plus many things more. The goal for 2024 is clear – win another title. I have full confidence in the new lead crew and their team, they will outperform everything we have seen from HSR enhanced until this day. And with Florian Hauser as pilot, we will see lightning speed on the race day.
The story of pilot Florian Hauser
The organizers released a series of videos telling the personal story of some of the competing pilots. The pilot of the HSR Enhanced team, Florian Hauser, “is a tetraplegic since he had a motorcycle accident in 2014. However, this does not prevent him from riding fast. Not on a bike anymore, but in his wheelchair,” as the organizers describe. Apart from being the winner of his discipline in this 2020 edition, Florian also won CYBATHLON 2016 and the CYBATHLON wheelchair Series in Japan.
Winning team: Angel Robotics with pilot Byeong-Uk Kim
The last edition of CYBATHLON took place on 13-14 November, 2020. This competition, created by ETH Zurich and run as a non-profit project, aims to advance in the research and development of assistive technology by involving developers, people with disabilities, and the general public. We had the chance to interview the winning team of the powered exoskeleton race, Angel Robotics from South Korea.
In this race, pilots with complete thoracic or lumbar spinal cord injury from nine teams competed using an exoskeleton. This wearable, powered support enables them to walk and master other everyday tasks. Indeed, the motivation behind this race is that “the use of exoskeletons is still rare, they are currently mainly used for physiotherapy in hospitals and rehabilitation centers. Exoskeletons dramatically increase the mobility of people with paraplegia, which consequently improves their overall physical and psychological health and therefore might represent a welcome addition to a wheelchair”, as the organizers of CYBATHLON state. This race involved:
(1) Sitting down & standing up from a sofa, and stacking cups while standing next to a table to test the range of motion and strength in the knee and hip joints, and stability.
(2) Slaloming around furniture without displacing it to test precision of steps and agility.
(3) Crossing uneven terrain to test precision of steps and adaptation of step lengths and widths.
(4) Climbing and descending stairs to test range of motion and strength in the knee and hip joints, and step precision.
(5) Walking across a tilted path to test the lateral range of motion in hip and foot joints, and stability.
(6) Climbing a ramp, opening and closing the door in the middle of the ramp, and descending the ramp to test the range of motion in foot, knee and hip joints, stability and maneuvering in confined spaces.
Powered exoskeleton race tasks. Credit: CYBATHLON
The top three teams were the company Angel Robotics (1) from South Korea with pilot Byeong-Uk Kim, TWIICE from EPFL research group REHAssist with pilot Silke Pan, and Angel Robotics (2) with pilot Lee Joo-Hyun. Remarkably, the three of them achieved the highest score – 100 points. With this impressive result, the podium was decided based on finishing time. If you can’t wait to watch how tight the races were, you can enjoy them in the recorded livestream below (from time 3:10:30).
You can see the results from the rest of the teams in this discipline here, or watch the recoreded livestreams of both days on their website.
Interview to Kyoungchul Kong – Team leader of Angel Robotics team
We had the pleasure to interview Kyungchul Kong, team leader and CEO of Angel Robotics (1&2). He is also an Associate Professor of KAIST (Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology).
Kyoungchul Kong – Team leader of Angel Robotics team
D. C. Z.: What does it mean for your team to have won in your CYBATHLON category?
K.K.: In WalkON Suit, the powered exoskeleton of Angel Robotics, there have been various dramatic technical advances. Since the first Cybathlon in 2016, the walking speed has become as fast as people without disabilities. The most important feature of WalkON Suit is its balance; as the center of mass is placed on the area of feet while standing straight, the wearer can stand without much effort for a long time. These superior functionalities of WalkON Suit could be proved by winning the Gold and Bronze medals at Cybathlon 2020.
D. C. Z.: And what does it mean for people with disabilities?
K.K.: While winning the Gold medal is glorious, winning two medals is especially meaningful. The physical conditions of the two pilots (i.e., the Gold medalist and the Bronze medalist) of Team Angel Robotics were extremely different. One was a male with very strong upper body, while the other was a female with much less muscles. Such different people could be successfully assisted by WalkON Suit, which means that the powered exoskeleton is not a technology optimized for a single user, but able to be utilized by many people with different body conditions.
D. C. Z.: What are still your challenges?
K.K.: In order to bring the WalkON Suit into the real life of people who need this technology, it has to be much improved in terms of wearability, price, and weight. The user should be able to wear the robot without anyone else’s help. It should be light enough to handle while sitting on a wheelchair. The price is another critical issue considering practical conditions. With these restrictions, the functionalities and performance of the robot must not be deteriorated. These are the challenges we are much trying to get over.
What if you could ride your own giant LEGO electric skateboard, make a synthesizer that you can play with a barcode reader, or build a strong robot dog based on the Boston Dynamics dog robot? Today sees the start of a new series of videos that focuses on James Bruton’s open source robot projects.
I discovered James’ impressive work in this episode of Ricardo Tellez’s ROS Developers Podcast on The Construct, which I highly recommend. Whether you enjoy getting your hands dirty with CAD files, 3D-printed parts, arduinos, motors and code, or you like learning about the full research & development (R&D) process of a robotics project, you will have loads of hours of fun following this series.
Today I brought one of James’ coolest and most successful open source projects: openDog and its different versions. In James’ own words, “if you want your very own four-legged friend to play fetch with and go on long walks then this is the perfect project for you.” You can access all the CAD files and code here. And without further ado, here’s the full YouTube playlist of the first version of openDog:
James also released another series of videos developing an affordable version of openDog: Mini Robot Dog. This robot is half the size of openDog and its mechanical components and 3D-printed parts are much more cheaper than the former robot without sacrificing compliance. You can see the full development in the playlist below, and access the open source files of version 1 and version 2.
Based on the insight gained through the R&D of openDog, Mini Robot Dog and these test dogs, James built the ultimate robot dog: openDog V2. For this improved version of openDog, he used brushless motors which can be back-driven to increase compliance. And by adding an Inertial Measurements Unit, he improved the balance of the robot. CAD files and code are available here. If you want to find out whether the robot is able to walk, check out the openDog V2 video series:
If you like James Bruton’s project, you can check out his website for more resources, updates and support options. See you in the next episode of our focus series!
The 2020 IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS) has teamed up with Black in Robotics (website, Twitter) to release a new special series named BiR-IROS: Black in Robotics with the support of Toyota Research Institute. This series consists of three short but powerful videos of roboticists giving personal examples of why diversity matters in robotics, showcasing their research and explaining what got them into robotics.
BiR-IROS: Black in Robotics is available for free through the OnDemand platform until 25 November (located under Technical Talks or at this link). Here’s a list of all the speakers and organisations who took part in the videos:
The show looks at the people at the forefront of robotics research. How did they become roboticists? What made them proud and what challenges did they face? What advice would they give to their younger self? What does a typical day look like? And where do they see the future of robotics? If you want to find out, watch the series for free on the IROS On-Demand platform until 25 November (located under Technical Talks or at this link).
The series features the following roboticists:
Michelle Johnson (Associate Professor of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation at the University of Pennsylvania): Robots that Matter
Davide Scaramuzza (Professor and Director of the Robotics and Perception Group at the University of Zürich): Drones & Magic
Dennis Hong (Professor of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering at the University of California Los Angeles): Making People Happy
Ruzena Bajczy (Professor Emerita of Electrical Engineering and Computer Sciences at the University of California Berkeley): Foundations
Peter Corke (Distinguished Professor of Robotic Vision at the Queensland University of Technology): Learning
Radhika Nagpal (Fred Kavli Professor of Computer Science at Harvard University): Enjoying the Ride
Involving potential users of a particular technology in the research and development (R&D) process is a very powerful way to maximise success when such technology is deployed in the real world. In addition, this can speed up the R&D process because the researchers’ perspective to the problem is combined with that of end-users. The non-profit project CYBATHLON was created by ETH Zurich as a way to advance R&D of assistive technology through competitions that involve developers, people with disabilities, and the general public.
Over 50 teams from all over the world will compete against each other in the Cybathlon 2020 Global Edition. (Credit: Alessandro Della Bella / ETH Zürich)
This 13th and 14th of November, the CYBATHLON 2020 edition is taking place. The event will be live-streamed, and it is completely open to the public. You can access it through their website. Here’s the full programme for the two days:
Friday, 13 November 2020
4pm CET (3pm UTC): Brain-Computer Interface Race
The power of thoughts
Welcome to CYBATHLON 2020 Global Edition!
Kick-off by the head of competition, Lukas Jaeger
Races of all teams
Team stories and insights
Analysis by the BCI expert Nicole Wenderoth of ETH Zurich
Special guest: Joël Mesot, President of ETH Zurich
The top 4: Who will win?
5pm CET (4pm UTC): Powered Arm Prosthesis Race
Grasping and feeling
Races of all teams
Team stories and insights
Guest: Roger Gassert, researcher on assistive technologies at ETH Zurich
Analysis by the arm prosthesis expert Michel Fornasier
The top 4: Who will win?
6pm CET (5pm UTC): Functional Electrical Stimulation Bike Race
Power to the muscles
Races of all teams
Team stories and insights
Guest: Robert Riener, initiator of CYBATHLON
Analysis by Claudio Perret, expert in functional electrical stimulation
The top 4: Who will win?
7pm CET (6pm UTC): Inside CYBATHLON – Stories, recap and outlook
Insights of the protagonists and organisers – the journey of CYBATHLON
Robert Riener, initiator of CYBATHLON
Roger Gassert, researcher on assistive technologies at ETH Zurich
Florian Hauser, powered wheelchair pilot of team HSR enhanced
Roland Sigrist, director of CYBATHLON
The medical checks
Who can compete? Insights of the medical examiners Zina-Mary Manjaly and Jirí Dvořák
Focus: Inclusion
Recap and outlook
Saturday, 14 November 2020
1pm CET (12pm UTC): Powered Wheelchair Race
Overcoming stairs and ramps
Races of all teams
Insights of the head of competition, Lukas Jaeger
Team stories and insights
Guest: Roger Gassert, researcher on assistive technologies at ETH Zurich
Analysis by scientist Sue Bertschy
The top 4: Who will win?
2pm CET (1pm UTC): Powered Leg Prosthesis Race
Watch your step
Races of all teams
Team stories and insights
Guest: Robert Riener, initiator of CYBATHLON
Analysis by expert Lukas Christen, parathlete and coach
The top 4: Who will win?
3pm CET (2pm UTC): Powered Exoskeleton Race
Walking in robotic suits
Races of all teams
Guest: Roger Gassert, researcher on assistive technologies at ETH Zurich
Analysis by the exoskeleton developers Jaime Duarte and Kai Schmidt
The top 4: Who will win?
4pm CET (3pm UTC): Inside CYBATHLON – Stories, recap and outlook
Insights of the protagonists and organisers – the future of CYBATHLON and social inclusion
Silke Pan, Powered Exoskeleton Pilot of team TWIICE
Robert Riener, Initiator of CYBATHLON
New systems
Maria Fossati, powered arm prosthesis pilot of team SoftHand Pro
Max Erick Busse-Grawitz, expert on mechatronics
Roger Gassert, researcher on assistive technologies at ETH Zurich
Recap and outlook – the CYBATHLON @school and the next CYBATHLON
Special guest: Sarah Springman, rector of ETH Zurich
