The robot named Madeline is pictured above. She is one of the robots currently being studied at Vassar College’s labs to further students’ understanding of the kind of evolution that took place over 500 million years ago. By mimicking subtle changes in the animal’s skeletal structure or appendages, the students are observing which changes are working better in a simulated predator/prey environment, and thus modeling the process of natural selection.

Take a moment to consider how fascinating this use of robotics is. There has hitherto been no way to study these long extinct creatures accurately with respect to physical changes. Computer simulation programs are fallible, and do not afford the researcher the chance to observe the results. Robotics changes all of that! The popularity of this method of biological simulation in the study of evolution is becoming widespread as the science of robotics progresses because the movement of robots is becoming increasingly organic and fine-tunable.

“At Harvard University, George Lauder, professor of organismic and evolutionary biology, studies fish locomotion with the aid of robotic fins. He says scientists are not trying to build spitting images of animals, but rather to mimic certain characteristics – a fin or a spinal column – to study how they work. Scientists then alter that characteristic to see how it affects performance…’The thing about robots is, robots can’t violate the laws of physics,’ he said. ‘A computer program can.’ Lauder said there’s no substitute for building a device that can replicate the minutely complex features of an animal. He expects the rise of robots in biological research to accelerate as more advances are made.” source

Check out this video to see the Vassar College students at work! 

Saturday, Saturday, Saturday! That’s right, this Saturday is Bots 4 Tots’s first workshop of the summer, hosted jointly by Bots 4 Tots and 826CHI’s The Boring Store! At 1PM on Saturday the 16th, five children will be coming to the Robot City Workshop to build their own robots! Since this is our first workshop, Don and I took a moment this week to assemble the kits ourselves so that we can best aid the kids when/if they need a little guidance. See us at work after the jump!

The inaugural bot was a ton of fun to put together! We have no doubt that the kids will love it, and through assembling it, gain an awareness of the integral mechanics of toys like it. From testing the PC board, motor and sensor to securing the final screw, it’s great fun and a wonderful starting point to get kids ages 10-15 interested in further projects!

We are looking forward to such fascinating questions as “What in the heck is this?!”. Seriously, Don and I are giddy with excitement for a participant to ask us what a capacitor (“this thing”) or a resistor (“that thing”) is this weekend, or to ask about the plus and minus signs next to the black and red wires. But don’t get me wrong, we’re not going to try and teach every child in attendance everything about electronics in one sitting. We are going to introduce the concept behind the sensor, the PC board, the motor and the power source before we begin building, of course, but we want them to determine the pace of learning beyond that. We will be happy to talk the kids’ ears off if they are interested and want to know more than just the basics! It’s all about the kids and what they will want individually. We understand that some of them may want to do it themselves, and effectively tell us to buzz off. That’s cool! Or some might want every little bit explained and demonstrated- a hands on approach works best for some. I know it does for me! Some might fly through the exercise while others might work more slowly and steadily. However each child will approach the building of his or her bot is great; we want him or her to be in control of defining the experience.

We cannot wait to post all sorts of pictures of the kids’ discovery process, of little minds expanding and working, and the smiles of achievement! And because this, our first workshop of the summer, is a special cooperative effort between B4T and 826CHI, it will have the added bonus of a second session: a writing workshop held the following week at The Boring Store in which the kids will explore the personalities of their robots and place them in settings, imaginary or real, while overcoming fantastic hurdles! 

Stay tuned for pictures from our first workshop next week, and stories and pictures from the kids the week after that!

We won’t deny it; Don and I love us some Lego, but when we found out about the FIRST Lego League, we fell in love with Lego all over again! FIRST holds a number of competitions, with leagues forming for kids as young as six, and they are heavily focused on bringing robotics and electronics to children. We applaud their monumental efforts in bringing together kids from all over the world under their common interest in robotics!

Founder Dean Kamen:  ”Our mission is to inspire young people to be science and technology leaders, by engaging them in exciting mentor-based programs that build science, engineering and technology skills, that inspire innovation, and that foster well-rounded life capabilities including self-confidence, communication, and leadership.” 

Well said!

Click here to learn more about the FIRST Lego League, for kids ages 9-14, or here to join/start a team for the 2009 event! If your child has particiapted in a Bots 4 Tots workshop and is interested in exploring robotics further, please consider recommending joining a local team to continue his or her adventure in learning! 

Ok, ok, so this is not exactly site related, but I celebrated my 26th birthday this past weekend and I wanted to show off this awesome gift bag my girl Jess gave me my present in. Isn’t it the best? Well, I got some pretty fun stuff, including this:

Check it out! A Webster’s Dictionary circa 1916 from my dear Mom. She’s had this sucker ever since I can remember, and I always coveted it. She gave it to me for my birthday this year (what an honor!), and considering our last blog post, I was curious to see if there was indeed no entry for the word “robot”. Sure enough…

It’s rather hard to believe! Once upon a time, there was officially no word in the English language to desrcibe an idea that may or may not have been previously used. Pre-industrial revolution, I think that the closest thing to a robot was a golem type monster, something that we in our modern time would place in the realm of fantasy rather than science fiction.  I think the most fascinating thing about opening up this dictionary and not being able to find the word “robot”, this wholly tangible revelation, is the way it has made me consider Science Fiction; that science, even approaching it as we think of the term today, has not been a part of the collective consciousness for all of man’s history. You may be saying something along the lines of “Well, duh…”, but I honestly feel that it is something we often take for granted in our new-fangled culture. 

Oh, oh, and in that same vein, there’s also this:

Our good friends at Robot Snob have recently asked us to do an interview for their site, and we are more than happy to oblige! The questions are really fun, and include some juicy ones about how Don and I became interested in robotics ourselves and what kind of projects we’ve worked on in our spare time. It’s going to be good, so stay tuned and don’t miss it! In the meantime, check out this article that Robot Snob did to announce the upcoming interview and praise the program. We are so incredibly ecstatic that B4T is being so well received!

If you’ve seen this, then you understand the magic. If you haven’t, then please allow me to introduce you to the Keepon robot, a wonderful mixture of technology and poofball that will leave you in a frenzy of infantile clapping and chair-bouncing. At least, that’s the effect it had on me. I wonder: will you experience the same roller-coaster of emotion that I did upon viewing this video? 

At first, I was skeptical. I mean, look at it. It’s basically two yellow rice balls with eyes. Then I was amused. This is mildly distracting, I thought, and began to turn my attention back toward the research whose tangent had led me here. But then it happened. In the slightest of alterations, the movement was subtly different, and I was tantalized beyond description. It had me in its fatally cute clutches, and I was done for.

In this video, we see the Keepon dynamically reacting to the music, changing its patterns in a surprisingly life-like manner. In fact, I am certain that this little guy dances better than a majority of the people I have seen booty-shakin’ in extent of my lifetime. It was developed in Japan to interact and communicate with children behaviorally and was designed for a multitude of applications, most especially for interacting socially with children to assist in their development.

In my case, however, it effected an overdose of adorability that almost caused my head to explode.