Now read the text to check your assumptions.

 Robots are increasingly found in the workplace, the home, outer space, and even the battlefield. They are no longer seen as replacements for human workers. They are still used for routine tasks but they can now perform tasks impossible for humans. Some of the robots in Switch on provide good examples of the components of a variety of robots and their capabilities.

The snake-arm robot is used for assembly and inspection tasks and can penetrate difficult-to-reach places. It can be programmed to perform those tasks without continuous human guidance.

Asimo is a humanoid robot which is capable of intelligent behavior. It can recognize objects and gestures, calculate distances and the direction of movement of several objects. Asimo has advanced engineering and control systems to allow it to walk naturally and translate visual information into actions.

The Mars Rover must navigate over complex terrains, thinking several steps ahead. It has to be able to work independently from ground control because communication delays and interruptions in space are unavoidable.

The robotic mower may look simple but it has a guidance system that keeps it within the lawn and makes sure it cuts in perfectly straight lines.

Engineers working on the design of robots: advanced knowledge of Mechanical, Electrical and Electronic engineering. They must understand how computers can be used to control movements using electric motors, pneumatics, and hydraulics, have a sensory system which replicates some or all human senses such as sight, smell, and touch. They have a processor to interpret those signals and to act autonomously or feed back the signals of human controller.

Bomb and mine disposal are dangerous jobs that require expertise and involve considerable risk to anyone involved. The solution is to send in machinery. Comet III is an example of a robot specific for a single task.

There are many robotics competitions that challenge entrants to devise a robot to overcome a variety of problems. Some of these are purely for entertainment such as the Robot Wars that was shown on television. Others have a more serious scientific or educational side such as the one run by Dean Kamen, the inventor of the Segway, an innovative two-wheeled, self-balancing human transporter. Others, like the robot car race will generate research with an immediate commercial use.

Ask your partner to identify the following word combination.

to penetrate difficult-to-reach places

to recognize objects and gestures

to translate visual information into activity

to navigate ever complex terrains

to replicate human senses

to feed back a signal

to dispose bomb and mine

to involve considerable risk to anyone involved

to challenge robotics competition entrants to devise a robot

Match the words in 1-6 with those in a-f to make collocations which all appear in the text.

1. outer	a. guidance
2. robot	b. work
3. human	c. system
4. independent	d. overcoming
5. guidance	e. capabilities
6. problem	f. space

Brainstorm with a partner.

1. What country has about 50% of the world robots?

2. What percentage of the world’s robots are used in a car industry?

3. What kinds of working robots have you heard about? What do they do?

You are at the Industrial Robot Convention. You are conducting a survey of people (surgeons, construction engineer, and electronic engineer) who use robots in their work. Ask about their robots and make notes in the form.

robot user survey
occupation of user
types of robot used
functions of robot workplace
specification of robot
how it works
strengths
weakness
possible improvements

 

Read the text again and render the meaning of high paragraphs (2-6)

 

ROBOTS

 

Read the text. Collect as much information as possible about new abilities of robots.

Types of robots

While most robots today are installed in factories or homes, performing labour or life saving jobs, many new types of robot are being developed in laboratories around the world. Much of the research in robotics focuses not on specific industrial tasks, but on investigations into new types of robot, alternative ways to [hint about or design robots, and new ways to manufacture them. It is expected that these new types of robot will be able to solve real world problems when they are finally realized.

Nanorobots: Nanorobotics is the still largely hypothetical technology of creating machines or robots at or close to the scale of a nanometer (10-9 meters). Also known as nanobots or nanites, they would be constructed from modular machines. So far, researchers havemostlyproduced only parts of these complex systems, such as bearings, sensors, and Synthetic molecular motors. Researchers also hope to be able to create entire robots as small as viruses or bacteria, which could perform tasks on a tiny scale. Possible application include microsurgery (on the level of individual cells).

Soft Robots: Robots with silicone bodies and flexible actuators, controlled using fuzzy logic and neural networks, look and feel different from robots with rigid skeletons, and are capable of different behaviors.

A few researchers have investigated the possibility of creating robots which can alter their physical form to suit a particular task mostly consist of a small number of cube shaped units, which can move relative to their neighbors, for example SuperBot. Algorithms have been designed in case any such robots become areality.

Swarm robots: Inspired by colonies of insects such as ants and bees, researchers are modeling the behavior of swarms of thousands of tiny robots which together perform a useful task, such as finding something hidden, cleaning, or spying. Each robot is quite simple, but the behavior of the swarm is more complex. The whole set of robots can be considered as one single distributed system, in the same way an ant colony con be considered a superorganism, exhibiting swarm intelligence.

 

Brainstorm in groups.

Make predictions about new types of robots that may be developed in the future. Explain the purposes for which they may be applied.

 

 

Unit 8