Taiwan plans to build robot pandas

A CUTTING-EDGE lab in Taiwan aims to develop panda robots that are friendlier and more artistically endowed than their endangered real-life counterparts.

THE Centre for Intelligent Robots Research said its world-first panda robot was taking shape at the hands of an ambitious group of scientists hoping to add new dimensions to the island's reputation as a high-tech power.

"The panda robot will be very cute and more attracted to humans. Maybe the panda robot can be made to sing a panda song,'' the centre's 52-year-old director Jerry Lin said.

Day by day, the panda has evolved on the centre's computer screens and, if funding permitted, the robot would take its first steps by the end of the year.

"It's the first time we try to construct a quadrupedal robot," Jo Po-chia, a doctoral student who is in charge of the robot's design, said.

"We need to consider the balance problem."

The robo-panda was just one of many projects on the drawing board at the centre attached to the National Taiwan University of Science and Technology.

The Taipei-based centre also aimed to build robots that looked like popular singers, so exact replicas of world stars could perform in the comfort of their fans' homes.

"It could be a Madonna robot. It will be a completely different experience from just listening to audio,'' Mr Lin said.

Mr Lin and his team were also working on educational robots that acted as private tutors for children, teaching them vocabulary or telling them stories in foreign languages.

There is an obvious target market: China, with its tens of millions of middle-class parents doting on the one child they are allowed under strict population policies.

"Asian parents are prepared to spend a lot of money to teach their children languages,'' Mr Lin said.

Robots running amok were a fixture of popular literature but parents did not have to worry about leaving their children home alone with their artificial teachers, he said.

"A robot may hit you like a car or a motorbike might hit you," he said.

"But it won't suddenly lose control and get violent. Humans lose control, not robots. It's not like that.''

Mr Lin's long-term dream was to create a fully-functioning Robot Theatre of Taiwan, with an ensemble of life-like robots able to sing, dance and entertain.

Two robotic pioneers, Thomas and Janet, appeared before an audience in Taiwan in December, performing scenes from the Phantom of the Opera, but that was just the beginning, Mr Lin said.

"You can imagine a robot shooting down balloons, like in the wild west, using two revolvers, or three, but much faster than a person," Mr Lin said.

"Some things robots can do better than humans with the aid of technologies."

Driverless trucks and voice-activated pets could be commonplace by 2019

Driverless juggernauts could be on our roads within ten years, experts predict.

And these trucks look like being the forerunners of a robot revolution.

According to the Royal Academy of Engineering, artificially intelligent robots and computers capable of making life and death decisions will become more and more common in all aspects of life.

The academy wants a public debate about the social, legal and ethical issues raised by the increasing use of 'thinking' machines such as surgeons, soldiers, babysitters, therapists, carers for the old and even sex partners.



Their report, called Autonomous Systems, explains how the computer-directed trucks would use data from laser-radar, video cameras and sat-nav to steer through traffic and pedestrians.

Report co-author Professor Will Stewart, of Southampton University, said driverless lorries and cars would make motoring far safer.

'The machine is a perfectly safe object. It is not prone to some of the things that you and I are prone to,' he said. 'It can run 24 hours a day without getting tired and it will always do the same thing.'

He said the technology is already in place for driverless cars and robotic taxis that take passengers to any destination are likely within 20 years. Fully automated trains are already in use on London's Docklands Light Railway and a driverless taxi that can do 25mph on a network of narrow roads will be launched next year at Heathrow.



Professor Stewart said automated vehicles would be most useful for haulage, adding: 'I think in ten years 30 per cent of trucks could be machine-operated.' Their computers will be programmed to predict the behaviour of other road users, to slow down safely if other vehicles get too close and to learn from their mistakes.

If a lorry detected a mechanical or software fault it would pull over and radio for help.



THE AGE OF AUTOMATED ASSISTANTS

DRIVERLESS VEHICLES

Using laser-radar and cameras they will scan for traffic and build up a 3-D picture of the road around them. They will be programmed to anticipate dangers such as pedestrians crossing, other vehicles and debris. Driverless taxis are due to appear at Heathrow next year

ROBOTIC PETS

Intelligent and responsive robot dogs, pets and birds that react to voice commands and seek out their owner's company. Can be fitted with sensors and alarms to alert relatives if their owner falls ill.

ROBOT SURGEONS

An autonomous robot was used in a kidney transplant in London in June. Initially designed for remote areas or battlefields, they could be fitted with 3-D ultrasound and video cameras and used for routine operations.

ROBOT BABYSITTERS

Primitive versions on sale in Japan can recognise faces, make conversation and keep track of babies. Later models could educate and entertain children and contact parents by phone or alarm if they get into trouble or fall ill.