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ESA's Navigation Laboratory has a new recruit: this drone can carry different types of satellite navigation receivers to collect data for follow-on analysis.

Imagine a small autonomous vehicle that could drive over land, stop, and flatten itself into a quadcopter. The rotors start spinning, and the vehicle flies away. Looking at it more closely, what do you think you would see? What mechanisms have caused it to morph from a land vehicle into a flying quadcopter? You might imagine gears and belts, perhaps a series of tiny servo motors that pulled all its pieces into place.

Over the past few decades, roboticists and computer scientists have developed increasingly advanced systems that can interact with humans and complete numerous everyday tasks. While robots are rapidly advancing, for humans to effectively start using them they should be able to trust in their abilities and find them helpful and appealing.

The word robot may conjure images of hard, metallic bodies that are invulnerable to attacks. In modern day-to-day life, however, robots are hardly needed for defending against enemy attacks. Instead, they are required to perform more mundane tasks such as handling delicate objects and interacting with humans. Unfortunately, conventional robots perform poorly at such seemingly simple tasks. Moreover, they're heavy and often noisy.

To operate autonomously in a various unfamiliar settings and successfully complete missions, mobile robots should be able to adapt to changes in their surroundings. Visual teach and repeat (VT&R) systems are a promising class of approaches for training robots to adaptively navigate environments.

A team of researchers at Johannes Kepler University Linz has used biodegradable materials as ink to print 3D soft robots. In their paper published in the journal Science Robotics, the group describes how they developed their ink and how well it performed. Yu Jun Tan, with the National University of Singapore has published a Focus piece in the same journal issue, outlining the issues researchers have faced in creating robots out of biodegradable materials and the work done by the team in Austria.

People are more comfortable talking to female rather than male robots working in service roles in hotels, according to a study by Washington State University researcher Soobin Seo.

A new drive system for flapping wing autonomous robots has been developed by a University of Bristol team, using a new method of electromechanical zipping that does away with the need for conventional motors and gears.

The implementation of robotics in various aspects of life is becoming increasingly widespread, but nevertheless leads to conflicting opinions. Positive factors and arguments based on innovation, efficiency, precision and cost reduction have not yet succeeded in breaking down negative connotations and aspects such as the destruction of jobs, the investment required, difficulties in implementation and the training necessary for its use. These controversies are heightened in the field of health, which is a reflection of this social trend of conflicting opinions.

Science fiction novelists couldn't have come up with a crazier plot: microrobots streaming through blood or through other body fluids that are driven by light, can carry drugs to cancer cells and drop off the medication on the spot. What sounds like a far-fetched fantasy, it is the short summary of a research project now published in Science Robotics. The microswimmers presented in the work could one day perform tasks in living organisms or biological environments that are not easily accessible. Looking even further ahead, the swimmers could perhaps one day treat cancer or other diseases.

A team of researchers from Université de Cergy-Pontoise, the College of the Holy Cross and Montpellier University, has found that when humans interact with robots, they tend to synchronize their movements with it in ways similar to their interactions with other humans. Their paper is published on the open access site PLOS ONE.

Cambridge engineers have shown how a robotic arm can control the journey of a floating object remotely by manipulating surface waves on the water. Using recent advances in deep reinforcement learning—a field of artificial intelligence (AI) best suited to managing complex decision-making—the team have come up with a way to model the fluid interactions, providing a data-driven approach to solving a complex fluid dynamics problem.

Soft machines—a subcategory of robotics that uses deformable materials instead of rigid links—are an emerging technology commonly used in wearable robotics and biomimetics (e.g., prosthetic limbs). Soft robots offer remarkable flexibility, outstanding adaptability, and evenly distributed force, providing safer human-machine interactions than conventional hard and stiff robots.

A whole generation of gripping robots has been developed using a design concept originally known from fish fins. An international research team from Biomechanics, with participation from Kiel University (CAU), led by the University of Southern Denmark (SDU), has now optimized this gripping function inspired by insects and challenged this standard in robotics. They also transferred it from hand to foot elements for the first time. This would not only allow robots to grip better with less energy, but also to walk better on uneven surfaces. The findings were published in the journal Advanced Intelligent Systems and as the cover story of the current print issue.

A robot has performed laparoscopic surgery on the soft tissue of a pig without the guiding hand of a human—a significant step in robotics toward fully automated surgery on humans. Designed by a team of Johns Hopkins University researchers, the Smart Tissue Autonomous Robot (STAR) is described today in Science Robotics.