Modern technology affects different workers in different ways. In some white-collar jobs—designer, engineer—people become more productive with sophisticated software at their side. In other cases, forms of automation, from robots to phone-answering systems, have simply replaced factory workers, receptionists, and many other kinds of employees.
Dang robots are crummy at so many jobs, and they tell lousy jokes to boot. In two new studies, these were common biases human participants held toward robots.
Dr. Tracy Xu, lecturer in hospitality at the University of Surrey's School of Hospitality and Tourism Management, has published a paper in the International Journal of Contemporary Hospitality Management derived from interviews with 19 hotel HR experts to identify the key trends and major challenges that will emerge in the next 10 years and how leaders should deal with the challenges brought about by service robot technologies.
Overall, adding robots to manufacturing reduces jobs—by more than three per robot, in fact. But a new study co-authored by an MIT professor reveals an important pattern: Firms that move quickly to use robots tend to add workers to their payroll, while industry job losses are more concentrated in firms that make this change more slowly.
Nature is one of the most valuable sources of inspiration for researchers developing new robots and computational techniques. For instance, in recent years, research teams worldwide have tried to artificially replicate the behaviors observed in insects and the biological mechanisms underpinning them in tiny robots.
In many parts of the U.S., robots have been replacing workers over the last few decades. But to what extent, really? Some technologists have forecast that automation will lead to a future without work, while other observers have been more skeptical about such scenarios.
Oregon State University College of Engineering researchers used a vacuum cleaner and the personalities of three of the Seven Dwarfs from Snow White to demonstrate that people can correctly infer a robot's personality solely by how it moves.
A robot that can measure the body temperature of people, for example in the waiting rooms of the hospital, is under development by researchers at Umeå University and the University Hospital of Umeå.
Robots delivering meals, ghostly figures in hazmat suits and cameras pointed at front doors: China's methods to enforce coronavirus quarantines have looked like a sci-fi dystopia for legions of people.
Researchers at Google Research and the University of California, Berkeley, have recently developed an imitation learning system that could enable a variety of agile locomotion behaviors in robots. Their technique, presented in a paper pre-published on arXiv, allows robots to acquire new skills by imitating animals.
Coronavirus quarantine can be lonely, but at one Tokyo hotel converted to accept patients with mild symptoms, a humanoid robot will be there to offer support and encouragement—as well as admonishments and warnings.
Steady hands and uninterrupted, sharp vision are critical when performing surgery on delicate structures like the brain or hair-thin blood vessels. While surgical cameras have improved what surgeons see during operative procedures, the "steady hand" remains to be enhanced—new surgical technologies, including sophisticated surgeon-guided robotic hands, cannot prevent accidental injuries when operating close to fragile tissue.
Brain Corp."s autonomous driving software doesn't power sexy machines. Its mobile operating system instead controls squat, floor scrubbing robots used in supermarkets, malls and airports.
Researchers at Technische Universität München in Germany have recently developed an electronic skin that could help to reproduce the human sense of touch in robots. This e-skin, presented in a paper published in MDPI's Sensors journal, requires far less computational power than other existing e-skins and can thus be applied to larger portions of a robot's body.
In health technology, wearable robots are programmable devices designed to mechanically interact with the body of the wearer. Sometimes referred to as exoskeletons, their purpose is to support motor function for people with severe mobility impairments. But market adoption of exoskeletons has been limited due to factors such as the weight of the equipment and the sometimes inaccurate predictions of wearer's movements when walking on uneven ground or approaching an obstacle. However, recent advances in robotics, materials science and artificial intelligence could make these mobility assistance and rehabilitation tools more compact, lightweight and effective for the wearer.