$50,000 robot that looks like Scarlett Johansson

Interestingly creepy. Somebody's obsessed with Scarlett Johansson...

This designer spent over $50,000 to make a robot...that looks a whole lot like Scarlett Johansson.

INSIDER

Fastest robot to solve a Rubik's Cube - Guinness World Records

Whoa! That was incredibly fast! It even broke the previous record-breaking robot’s time of 0.9 by a fraction. Great video!...

The fastest robot to solve a Rubik's Cube ever is Sub1 with a time of 0.887 seconds, built by Albert Beer (Germany), and demonstrated at the Cubikon Store, in Munich, Germany, 23 January 2016.

 

Guinness World Records

VertiGo - A Wall-Climbing Robot Including Ground-Wall Transition

VertiGo is a wall-climbing robot that is capable of transitioning from the ground to the wall, created in collaboration between Disney Research Zurich and ETH. The robot has two tiltable propellers that provide thrust onto the wall, and four wheels. One pair of wheels is steerable, and each propeller has two degrees of freedom for adjusting the direction of thrust. By transitioning from the ground to a wall and back again, VertiGo extends the ability of robots to travel through urban and indoor environments.

 The robot is able to move on a wall quickly and with agility. The use of propellers to provide thrust onto the wall ensures that the robot is able to traverse over indentations such as masonry. The choice of two propellers rather than one enables a floor-to-wall transition - thrust is applied both towards the wall using the rear propeller, and in an upward direction using the front propeller, resulting in a flip onto the wall.

DisneyResearchHub

Miniature Origami Robot Self-folds, Walks, Swims, and Degrades

Oh, the possibilities! This tiny little thing they call a miniature origami robot is a unique drone specimen which weighs a third of a gram and is just 1.7 cm long. It starts out as a flat paper or polystyrene wafer which once activated via a small heat source, folds itself up into the complex shape you see above and can begin to do various tasks such as swim, climb a slope, carry a load and more! 

The drone's movement, recently revealed by MIT, is "powered" by two sets of magnets: a neodymium magnet integrated into the robot itself and another four electromagnetic coils located under the operating surface that attract and repel the onboard magnet as needed.

IEEE Spectrum

Info source: engadget

Robot VS Japanese Samurai Swordsman

This robot can slice a bean in half - lengthways! But so can his teacher, Japanese swordsman Isao Machii. The robot was designed by Japanese engineers to copy the moves of the renown samurai sword master, cutting hard-angled cuts with speed and precision. Machii is so swift and precise, he can slice a BB gun pellet fired at him at about 200 km per hour, (see 2nd vid), but he still lost the swordfight to the machine. In the end, it was the first to reach 1000 cuts! ...  

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kinsei1560

MIT cheetah robot lands the running jump

One small step for mankind, one giant leap for robots... Back in September we featured the Robotic Cheetah that could run, well, just like a real cheetah. Now those fine folks over at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, have 'programmed' this robotic cheetah to successfully jump and land over objects... 

Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT)

Incredible: Robot Stitches A Grape Back Together!

Aaah. Technology. Soon it'll take over the world. What's that? Oh. It already has. Our apologies...

The da Vinci Surgical System is used to stitch a grape back together. The same technology that can be used to suture a tiny grape is designed to help perform delicate, minimally invasive surgery.

 

NewsMedia

Robot chef, stirs, pours, and changes cooking temperature

A robot chef? Can it taste the food too to see if it needs a little more salt? ...

This dexterous robotic chef is able to mimic human cooking techniques to stir, pour, mix and more.

The robot has taken two years to develop and the creators, the Shadow Robot Company, hope to be able to launch a commercial version by 2017.

Factor Magazine

Robot Nom Nom

Now he's got talent! We thought it was a robot trying to be human and not the other way around, lol. The sound effects made it even more realistic! All he needs now is some robot make-up ...

maddchadd

Robot artist draws giant sketch on the beach

All in the name of art! It was sure cool watching this 'robot' artist draw some giant art sketches on a beach and he'll draw yours too! By using your phone or tablet, you can send a drawing to this little robot and watch it trace the lines in the sand by dragging a rake behind it. The robot on wheels was developed by Paul Beardsley from Disney Research Zurich and his colleagues at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology...

It computes a path across the sand that approximates the artwork and sets off. A rake attached to its rear etches the pattern in the sand. Each drawing takes about 10 minutes, and the idea is that the robot could be controlled remotely, turning the beach into a digitally controlled sketchbook.

Since the robot moves on three wheels, it is better at creating smooth curves rather than sharp corners. To carve a right angle in the sand, it draws a line then lifts the rake, before using a laser scanner and an inertial sensor to reposition itself so it can trace the intersecting line. - newscientist

New Scientist