One names robot a mechanical device achieving automatically tasks generally considered dangerous or painful for human.

The evolution of the electronic and the Informatique allows increasingly complex treatments. The definition of what is entered or not as robot varies according to the countries considered. With the Japan, for example, this category includes with the difference of the France number of programmable machine tools.

In spite of their cost high at the time (for lack of Microprocessor S powerful bulk products), the robots were essential very quickly, as of beginning of the year 70, for certain tasks like the Peinture of the automobie bodies, in atmosphere of toxic vapors.

Etymology

The term robot , derived from the word robota ( drudgery seigneuriale , work of serf in the Slavic languages. E.g.: “robotnik”, the worker, in Czech), was introduced by the Czech writer Karel Čapek into the part of Théâtre R.U.R. (Rossum' S Universal Robots) in 1920. This part was played for the first time in 1921. Although Karel Čapek is often regarded as the inventor of the word, it indicated itself his brother Josef, painter and writer, like the real inventor.

Some ensure that the word robot has initially used in the short part Opilec of Josef Čapek (the Drunkard) , published in the Lelio collection in 1917. According to the Company of the Čapek brothers in Prague, it would be inaccurate. The word employed in Opilec is Automate , whereas Robot appeared for the first time in RUR .

Whereas the robots of Čapek were human organics artificial, the word robot was taken to indicate human “mechanics”. The term Androïde can mean one or the other, whereas Cyborg (“cybernetic organization” or “man bionics”) would be a made creature of organic and artificial parts.

As for the Robot-like term , it was introduced into the literature in 1942 by Isaac Asimov in its book Runaround . It states there the “three rules of robotics” which will become thereafter “the three laws of robotics”.

Antiquity

The idea of artificial people probably goes back to the ancient legend of Cadmos, which, sowing teeth of dragon, created soldiers. The myth of Pygmalion, as for him, tells how the Galatée statue became alive. In traditional mythology, the god of the forging mills (Vulcan or Héphaïstos) created mechanical, unquestionable servants intelligent, others as young gilded slaves, others still in the shape of utility tripod tables driven by their own energy.

Rebirth

The first diagram of a robot humanoïde was the work of Léonard de Vinci in the neighborhoods of 1495. The notebooks of Vinci, redécouverts in the Years 1950, contained detailed drawings of a mechanical knight who was apparently able to rise, balance his arms, and to move his head and his jaw. The plan was probably based on its anatomical research compiled in the man vitruvien. It is not known if it tried to build this robot (see: Robot of Léonard de Vinci). XVIIIe and XIXe century

The first known operational robot was built by Jacques de Vaucanson in 1738, which created a androïde flutist, as well as a mechanical duck able to eat and déféquer. The news the man with sand of Ernest Theodore Amadeus Hoffmann (1817) described a mechanical woman with the pace of headstock, and Steam Man off the Prairies of Edward S. Ellis (1865) expresses the American fascination of industrialization. The vague arts person on the automats humanoïdes culminated with the electric Man of Luis Senarens in 1885.

XXe century

When technology arrived at the point where one could predict mechanical creatures (nonludic), the literary answers to the concept of robot caused fear that the human ones are replaced by their own creations. Frankenstein (1818), sometimes indicated like the first novel of Science fiction, became a synonym of this topic. When the part of Čapek RUR introduced the concept of an assembly line controlled by robots which try to build always more robots, the topic took an economic and philosophical consonance, reinforced by traditional film Metropolis (1927), and popular the the Star Wars (1977), Blade Runner (1982) and Terminator (1984).

XXIe century

Although the clone S are not robots strictly speaking, the topic of the opposition between the creature and its creator, following the example Frankenstein, is found in a film like The Island .

Industry

The robots are intensively used in the Industrie, where they carry out without slackening of the repetitive tasks and with rigor. In the assembly lines of Automobile industry , they replace there the Ouvrier S in the painful and dangerous tasks (Peinture, Soudage, Emboutissage, etc). The industrial Robots are often provided with systems of vision which get a flexibility of execution and means to them of checking the quality products manufactured.

The science of the robots names the Robotique.

Principles

The term robot corresponds to a quite precise type of system. Thus, so certain characteristics are not present, a machine, even very complex, cannot be described as robot . The most precise definition of the robot could be: “ mechanized automatic System able to carry out one or more tasks, in a given environment, in an autonomous way, by the execution of a program ”.

According to this definition, a machine as complex as an airliner is not a robot, whereas banal a Grill-pain can be called robot .

  • Indeed, an airliner, although embarking many automatic apparatuses and constituting a very complex whole of associated systems, remains under the control of the pilots who remain in top of the hierarchical pyramid of the systems. Takeoff with the landing, the apparatus is controlled and does not carry out a program allowing him to achieve all the tasks necessary without human control.
  • On the other hand, the toaster will carry out, once started , a task certainly single, very simple, but in an entirely autonomous way and without any external intervention, carrying out a program , a succession of instructions: indeed, the thermal switch thermostat which cuts the circuit of heating and ejects the bread sections as soon as the time of cooking is past can be regarded as an input unit, while the value of the adjustment can be regarded as a Variable of the program to carry out.

Thus the robot, programmable machine, cannot be separate Ordinateur, and in this respect must be defined like a unit of input/output, a peripheral. The diagram and the classical architecture of the machines with automatic treatment of data thus remain valid, even in the case of a future robot quasi autonomous, in conformity with the forecasts of the science fiction. The only difference between a desktop machine and a robot that the calculating unit (processor), the storage units (random access memory and permanent memory), the input units (cameras, etc) either are embarked in the system, or is ordered remotely. But the robot itself, as a mechanical device ordered by the central processing unit, remains a peripheral of exit. Whatever the complexity of the software enabling him to react to its environment, the robot is controlled, exactly as a printer which carries out a succession of programmed tasks. The robot thus remains a machine von Neumann, of which it is only one element. According to this definition, one can consider, even if this distinction is somewhat academic, that robots SWORD (evoked low) tested in this moment in Iraq, as well as the automatic laboratories operating over Mars are not, precisely, of genuine robots, since they acts only of systems radio-controlled by a human operator. On the other hand, of the automated systems like some space probes, some Drone S and the cruise missiles, constitutes many robots.

Autonomous robots

Thus one seeks to carry out systems able to only react to the environment, i.e. with certain unforeseen. It is this more or less great degree of Autonomie (of others like to better say Artificial intelligence) which brings closer the robots to the completely autonomous systems under consideration by the science fiction and the latest research.

A certain capacity of adaptation to an unknown environment can, in the current semi-autonomous systems, being assured provided that the Inconnu remains relatively foreseeable: the already operational example of the vacuum cleaner-robot (for example the iclebo or Trilobite d' Electrolux) in is a perfect illustration: the software which controls this apparatus is able to react to the obstacles which can meet in a dwelling, to circumvent them, to memorize them. It safeguards the plan of the apartment and can modify it where necessary. It turns over at the end of the program to be connected to its charger. It must thus provide a correct answer to the greatest possible number of stimulations, which are as many entered data, not by an operator, but by the environment. It is a robot in the purest direction of the term.

Autonomy supposes that the program of instructions envisages occurred of certain events, then the reactions appropriate to those. When the vacuum cleaner avoids a dresser because it knows that the dresser is there, it carries out an integral program this dresser, for example coordinates X there of its site. If this dresser is moved or removed, the robot is able to modify its plan consequently and, to treat a zone of the ground which it hitherto did not take into account, it then reaches a higher degree of autonomy.

When the autonomous robots are mobile, it is advisable to provide them a embarked energy source: generally a battery of electric fencer.

Robotics currently

  • Robot-like

List commercial robots or of laboratory

Robots humanoïdes:

Other robots:

  • Aibo, dog of company of which there existed more than 6 generations of increasing improvement. Sony put an end to this line of products in 2006 for reasons of economic targeting of the company Sony.
  • Iclebo, a completely autonomous vacuum cleaner robot for the house.
  • Bn-1, the robot cat of BANDAGED
  • PaPeRo, the robot of company by NEC, sucessor of R100
  • Qfix, kit of robot for education and hobby
  • Rabbit, biped robot intended for research on walk and the race. Site of Rabbit
  • Robot SpiderBot, robot having eight driving wheels of which those at the ends (which are thus four) have two degrees of freedom

industrial Robots:

  • Unimate, the 1st industrial robot
  • KUKA FAMULUS, the first robot with 6 trained axes in an electromechanical way (1973)
  • Lemur, industrial robot with 6 legs
  • Robot Delta, robot having a formed arm of handling of 3 parallelograms

Market of robotics

The number of robots in activity is in full explosion since about fifteen years, under the combined effects of technological advances and the fall of the costs (divided by four for the industrial robots between 1990 and 2003). They were distributed at the end of 2003:
  • 29% of domestic robots (including 94% of automatic vacuum cleaners (570 000 on the whole of which the iclebo and Roomba) and 37.000 automatic mowers);
  • 38% of industrial robots (either 800.000 on the whole, including 50% present in Japan, 31% in Europe and 14% in North America).
  • 33% of robots of leisures (692 000, of which a majority of Aibo of Sony).

The number of military robots is not determined, even if one excludes the missiles and other satellites. For the moment, the systems of weapon remain under total control of a human operator, even on systems in addition robotized. The Drone S are now rather widespread (because the sky is a place where it is rather easy to be driven without having to manage obstacles), and terrestrial robots are in experimentation in the arsenals of many countries. Most media S.W.O.R.D.S. tested by the E. - U is the machine. in Iraq

The growth of the number of robots in our environment will remain strong from here at 2007. The industrial robots (which one counts more than 20.000 applications, of the automobile assembly line to the automatic milking machine) should be a million this year (either 25% of rise). As for the domestic robots, they should be almost seven times more in 2005, with some new uses (washing of panes, of swimming pools).

Future developments

The Microrobotique is a field of study in full rise. The comprehension of the physical phenomena in handling on a micrometer scale and the miniaturization of the mechanisms are of a crucial interest for microphone-engineering. Research relates to the sensors as well, as the actuators and the Préhenseur S.

Many robotics engineers concentrate today on the human and animal locomotion. It is difficult problems, partly because of the computing power necessary. The study of the robots with legs has been undertaken for several decades, especially on robots hexapodes, quadripèdes, etc the tendency was then to copy flexibility, the robustness and the adaptability of the insects. This type of robot is statically stable, and thus easier to control.

Today one witnesses an intensification of research on the biped locomotion, which is by nature dynamically stable, therefore more difficult to control. But the advantages are considerable: progression in the knowledge of the Bipédie, better crossing of obstacle and adaptation to the human environment. Thus from many universities and undertaken, especially Japanese, launched out in the construction of robots humanoïdes.

Medical robotics is also very active. New robots are developed for the mini-invasive surgery and the téléchirurgie. Novel methods are exploited, like actuators AMS (memory-shape alloys), the microrobotique one and the interfaces Haptique S. Of the algorithms of analysis of images are developed in the same way.

Research was also directed towards navigation, the localization and the planning of trajectory. Underwater and space exploration are fields where robotics is of a great utility.

The future developments relate to also the robot-like vision, in particular with an aim of designing “intelligent” vehicles, or robots of monitoring and exploration.

Whereas autopilots are installed for a long time in the airliners, research having for goal to design terrestrial vehicles general public robotized runs up has many obstacles. If the localization hardly poses problems thanks to the GPS, the techniques of recognition of objects starting from images do not make it possible yet to recognize the various control panels perfectly road, nor to distinguish the objects present on the roadway or the pavement. In fact, a robot would have all the difficulties in face unforeseen.

Lastly, an important way of development relates to the training of the robots. The current robots cannot generally adapt to a new situation because one did not give them the possibility of learning and of improving their behaviors. However, of the techniques of training exist. A little as a child would do it, a robot could thus learn from new behaviors and adapt to configurations not envisaged at the beginning. This research orientation is currently in full rise.

Cinema

Literature

The literature of Science-fiction around the topic of the robots is plentiful in particular by:

Competitions

RoboCup is an international competition of which the goal is to develop a football team made up of completely autonomous robots humanoïdes. The objective is to gain against the world champions from here 2050. There exist several categories, which go from simulation to the robots full-scale humanoïdes. RoboCup is regarded as the world cup of robotics.

With the Japan, where robotics is very popular, the tournament of robots-sumos is one of the most famous competitions. The rule is simple: it is necessary to leave its adversary the adventure playground.

With the the United States, the Battlebots are combat violent one of armed robots, placed in a truffée arena of traps. These robots must obey precise rules (official site here). Similar competitions exist in England under the name of Robot Wars . These very popular combat also pass in television programs.

The popularity of the television programs such as Robot Wars and Battlebots , of the competitions of robots-sumos, the success of the “intelligent bombs” and the drones in the contemporary conflicts suggests that fear to see artificial forms of life becoming violent is not more one illusion.

The agency of advanced research of the American department of Defense (DARPA) finance of the technological projects such as the DARPA Great Challenge , a race in the desert of the Nevada which takes place every year. In October 2005, it is the machine designed by the Université Stanford, baptized Stanley, which gained the reward of 2 million dollars. Stanley is an automatic vehicle, driven by 7 network computers and which is guided by a radar and laser beams.

In France, the most famous competition is certainly the cut E=M6. It is its name more known, because this one changed name for “Coupe de France of robotics” in 1998. See the detailed article: Coupe de France of robotics Indeed, always in 1998, it gave birth to Eurobot, European competition of robotics, opened with all the countries of the world but being held in Europe. This one accommodates from now on more than 25 countries, the teams being qualified at the time of national meetings, being organized with the support of the international association Eurobot. See the detailed article: Eurobot

Since 2002, the departments of GEii of IUT of France also organize an annual meeting (at the beginning of June, in Vierzon) of following robots line to see here. The motorization and the energy source being imposed, the students compete mainly on the intelligence and the effectiveness of the part orders. A moulded frame can however be provided.

See too

Internal bonds

External bonds

Research laboratories
  • Portraits robots: research in robotics
  • animatlab: research laboratory in robotics affiliated to the lip6

Construction and programming of robots

  • fribotte: former team with concour E=M6 publishing of the didactic articles on the construction of Robot-like robot
  • Zone: tutoriaux current events, and files on robotics
  • Robot-maker: site of impassioned of robotics. collection of robots amateurs. community (forum) very active.
  • domo-robot: collective construction of open robots source, publication of the product of this Community work
  • robot-passion: Forum about robotics (very active)

Robot-like topicality

  • Connected Droïde: topicality of robotics
  • Site of the contest Eurobot
  • Of the robots for what to make? - Site of current events and tutoriels on the
  • Vieartificielle.com: robot, artificial life and artificial intelligence
  • newzy.fr: articles, vidéos and diaporamas on the robots

History and Company

  • mythical precursors of the robot
  • first Automats: antiquity at 1973
  • Robots and unconscious collective

Fiction and the robots

  • '' the myth of the robot in the fiction '', on the site '' Techno-Science.net ''. An adapted text of the work Robots genesis of artificial people, Minerva, designed and carried out by FYP editions, under the direction of Philippe Bultez Adams

  • company of edition which publishes extraordinary Robots of Cyril Fievet, Philippe Bultez Adams and Al and Robots genesis of artificial people, Special mention of the Roberval Price 2005

  • Karel Čapek : Father of the Robot

  • Isaac Asimov : Pope of the Robot

  • the Robot in the Western Cinema

Collection of robot

  • MP ROBOTS

Simple: Robot Zh-min-nan: Robot

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