Atlas Robot Is Giving Up Its Safety Cables For Robotic Competition

Contenders are getting ready for this year’s DARPA Robotics Challenge. One of the robots that seven teams will compete with has already gotten its upgrades. The Atlas robot is giving up its safety cables so it can comply with the more stringent guidelines of the DARPA Robotics Challenge finale taking place in June this year. DARPA has made some serious alterations the design of its humanoid robot, maintaining only the lower legs and feet of the previous version of the robot with the new machine named Atlas Unplugged.

By making use of lighter components for its body, the developers managed to include a 3.7kWh lithium-particle battery pack that can source the new Atlas for 60 minutes of strolling and different exercises. Its designers additionally embedded a remote router for correspondence, changed its wrists to have an enhanced twisting ability and set the robot with three perception machines for assignment planning, in addition to other enhancements.

Pentagon’s innovative weapons and automated technology division will convey an Atlas Unplugged to each of the seven groups using it for the drawn-out mechanical technology challenge.

The teams will then need to consider approaches to make them stand out from one another while meeting the new prerequisites.

The robotic competitors will now need to have the capacity to:

– work totally wireless

– stand and recuperate without intercession in the event that they fall or get stuck

– work all alone for short periods if a correspondence power outage should arise

DARPA’s current Robotics Challenge, coincidentally, is about seek- and- rescue humanoids. The strongest challenger used to be a Japanese-made humanoid dubbed S-One. However, the machine was bought by Google and was hauled out from the race.

An aggregate $3.5 million in prizes will now be offered to the first three contenders in the DARPA Robotics Challenge, with the final phase being held June 5-6, 2015, at Fairplex in Pomona, Calif.

The new award structure was made in appreciation of both the critical advance officially exhibited by teams toward improvement of human-controlled robot engineering for emergency reaction and the expanded number of groups intending to contend in the Finals, including those subsidized by the European Union and the legislatures of Japan and South Korea. Aside from the already reported $2 million first prize, DARPA wants to offer $1 million to the runner-up and $500,000 to the team ranked third. DARPA expects no less than twenty groups to contend in the DRC Finals.

Other teams which might be interested in joining the DRC have until February 2, 2015, to enlist and submit materials. Qualified groups will be announced by DARPA at the beginning of March.

Image Source: Science News