We may earn revenue from the products available on this page and participate in affiliate programs. Learn more ›
Five years ago, Toyota announced a $1 billion commitment to its Research Institute (TRI) and hired hundreds of engineers to work on forward-thinking robotics and AI-driven products, such as self-driving cars. This week, TRI gave journalists a chance to attend a virtual open-house (part of which you can watch in the video embedded below) to see what the labs have been building.
The bulk of the prototypes shown during the event are meant to help people out around their homes. The idea of a helper robot has been around for decades, but it has already begun to gain more real-world traction, especially in countries such as Japan where an aging population could cause shortages in support staff.
TRI’s primary home robot design is built to hang from a special set of tracks built into a home’s ceiling. We typically imagine robot butlers rolling or actually walking around our spaces (due at least in some part to the awful robot butler in Rocky IV), but TRI says mounting a bot on the ceiling brings considerable advantages.
First, the robot has a simpler time learning the layout of the home—it doesn’t need to learn complex paths around obstacles to get from one place to another because there’s a kitchen island or a new recliner to get in its way. That also means the robot won’t get under foot as someone tries to navigate around their own home. TRI’s bot can fold up tightly to the ceiling when it’s not in use, so it effectively takes up zero usable space.
TRI also claims that the top-down viewpoint gives the machine a better point of view for observing its own actions and the relative position of different objects it might have to manipulate. Toyota is big on robots learning from limited sets of parameters. So, if you wanted the robot to learn to wipe down the countertops, a human could perform that action in VR and the robot would understand the human’s actions and mimic them in the real world while monitoring variables. If you wanted to teach the robot to clean your countertops, you could do it in VR and it would understand going forward. Also, through what’s known as fleet learning, a human could teach one bot, and other networked machines would get the same lessons.
Numerous joints in the robotic arm allow it to move in all directions. In fact, some of the joints are redundant, allowing it to rotate and orient itself in pretty much any position. The problem, however, is that the whole house needs to essentially be designed around the machine. Installing the complicated support system as an aftermarket product would be a huge undertaking (though, Toyota currently has no concrete plans to bring this to market yet anyway). Ideally, the robot would be a central part of the home’s planning before construction gets underway.
That concept makes more sense as it scales to multi-unit buildings like elder care facilities. If the builders could make the units look nearly identical on the inside, engineers could train one robot, then share that information with the rest of the networked machines.
In addition to the whole home bot, TRI also showed off some smaller aspects of the tech. The bubble gripper, for instance, is an automated claw with soft pads on its gripping surfaces. A light system projects a series of dots on the inside of the pads and a camera to observe how the pads deform when it picks up an object. As a result, the system can analyze—in real time—the properties of the object with which it’s interacting. The demo showed it stacking several delicate wine glasses on top of each other on an unfamiliar surface.
TRI has clearly made considerable progress on its robotic pursuits and plans to continue working on this kind of tech in the future. There’s no hard plans to make this available to the public just yet, but the company does hope to roll out at least some of these technologies in the near future. This segment is clearly growing globally as well. Back at CES, Samsung debuted a robotic chef concept that uses a similar ceiling-mounted design. That’s just a prototype as well, for now, but we’re clearly getting ever closer to the day when your personal bot can make you an omelette in the morning.
Tunaweza kupata mapato kutoka kwa bidhaa zinazopatikana kwenye ukurasa huu na kushiriki katika programu za washirika. Toyota ilitangaza mwaka jana kuwa itatoa dola bilioni moja kwa Taasisi yake ya Utafiti na kuajiri mamia ya wahandisi kufanya kazi kwenye roboti na bidhaa zinazoendeshwa na AI, kama vile magari ya kuendesha gari. TRI imetoa fursa kwa waandishi wa habari kuhudhuria nyumba ya wazi (sehemu ya ambayo unaweza kutazama katika video iliyoingizwa hapa chini) kuona nini maabara wamekuwa kujenga. Mengi ya prototypes iliyoonyeshwa wakati wa tukio ni maana ya kusaidia watu nje karibu na nyumba zao. Wazo la roboti ya msaidizi limekuwapo kwa miongo kadhaa, lakini tayari limeanza kupata traction zaidi ya ulimwengu halisi, haswa katika nchi kama vile Japan ambapo idadi ya watu wanaozeeka inaweza kusababisha upungufu wa wafanyikazi wa msaada. TRI ni moja ya makampuni ya roboti ya nyumbani ambayo hutumia vifaa vya kuunganisha vifaa vya kuunganisha vifaa vya kuunganisha vifaa vya kuunganisha vifaa vya kuunganisha vifaa vya kuunganisha vifaa vya kuunganisha vifaa vya kuunganisha vifaa vya kuunganisha vifaa vya kuunganisha vifaa vya kuunganisha vifaa vya kuunganisha. "Tunafikiria kwa kawaida roboti za butler kutembea au kutembea katika nafasi zetu (kwa sababu angalau kwa sehemu ya butler mbaya wa roboti katika Rocky IV), lakini TRI inasema ""kuweka bot kwenye dari huleta faida kubwa.""" Kwanza, robot ina wakati rahisi kujifunza mpangilio wa nyumba - haina haja ya kujifunza njia ngumu kuzunguka vikwazo kupata kutoka mahali moja hadi nyingine kwa sababu kuna kisiwa jikoni au recliner mpya kupata katika njia yake. Hiyo pia ina maana robot si kupata chini ya mguu kama mtu anajaribu kusafiri karibu na nyumba yao wenyewe. TRI's bot inaweza fold up tightly kwa dari wakati si katika matumizi, hivyo ni ufanisi inachukua sifuri nafasi inayoweza kutumika. TRI pia inadai kwamba mtazamo wa juu-chini inatoa mashine mtazamo bora kwa ajili ya kuchunguza vitendo vyake mwenyewe na nafasi ya jamaa ya vitu tofauti inaweza kuwa na udhibiti. Toyota ni kubwa juu ya roboti kujifunza kutoka seti ndogo ya vigezo. Kwa hiyo, kama unataka robot kujifunza kufuta chini countertops, binadamu inaweza kufanya kwamba hatua katika VR na robot kuelewa vitendo vya binadamu na kuiga yao katika ulimwengu wa kweli wakati wa ufuatiliaji vigezo. Kama unataka kufundisha robot kusafisha countertops yako, unaweza kufanya hivyo katika VR na ingekuwa kuelewa kwenda mbele. Pia, kupitia kile kinachojulikana kama kujifunza kwa meli, binadamu anaweza kufundisha bot moja, na mashine nyingine zilizounganishwa zitapata masomo sawa. Viungo vingi katika mkono huo wa roboti huwezesha mkono huo kusonga katika pande zote. Kwa kweli, baadhi ya viungo hivyo ni vya ziada, na hivyo vinaweza kuzunguka na kujielekeza katika nafasi yoyote ile. Hata hivyo, tatizo ni kwamba nyumba nzima inahitaji kubuniwa kwa kuzingatia mashine hiyo. Kuanzisha mfumo wa msaada wa hali ya juu kama bidhaa ya baada ya soko itakuwa mradi mkubwa (ingawa, Toyota kwa sasa haina mipango halisi ya kuleta hii kwenye soko bado). Kwa kawaida, roboti ingekuwa sehemu muhimu ya mipango ya nyumba kabla ya ujenzi kuanza. Dhana hiyo ina maana zaidi inapopandishwa kwa majengo yenye vitengo vingi kama vile vituo vya utunzaji wa wazee. Ikiwa wajenzi wangeweza kufanya vitengo hivyo kuonekana sawa ndani, wahandisi wangeweza kufundisha roboti moja, kisha kushiriki habari hiyo na mashine zingine zilizounganishwa. Kwa kuongezea, TRI pia ilionyesha sehemu ndogo za teknolojia. Kwa mfano, kifaa cha kukamata Bubble ni kifaa cha kuunganisha vitu kwa njia ya moja kwa moja ambacho kina vifuniko laini kwenye sehemu zake za kukamata. Mfumo wa taa unaonyesha mfululizo wa nukta ndani ya pads na kamera ili kuchunguza jinsi pads deform wakati inachukua kitu. Matokeo yake, mfumo unaweza kuchambua "katika muda halisi" mali ya kitu ambacho ni kuingiliana. Maonyesho hayo yalionyesha kioo hicho kikiwa kimeunganishwa juu ya kioo kingine kisicho cha kawaida. TRI imefanya maendeleo makubwa katika shughuli zake za roboti na mipango ya kuendelea kufanya kazi kwenye aina hii ya teknolojia katika siku zijazo. Hakuna mipango ngumu ya kufanya hii inapatikana kwa umma tu bado, lakini kampuni haina matumaini ya kuzindua angalau baadhi ya teknolojia hizi katika siku zijazo za karibu. Sehemu hii ni wazi kukua kimataifa pia. Katika CES, Samsung ilionyesha kifaa cha robotic kitengenezo cha kupikia ambacho kinaweza kuunganishwa na paa. Hiyo ni tu prototype pia, kwa sasa, lakini sisi ni wazi kupata karibu zaidi na siku ambapo bot yako binafsi inaweza kufanya wewe omelette asubuhi.