Archive for the 'Spying' Category

Military researchers have built a tiny drone that looks and flies just like a hummingbird. Even your garden isn’t safe now. Next time you see that pretty hummingbird sucking nectar from your flowers, you may just think twice about how cute it is.

This thing flaps its robotic wings to stay in air like the real thing. So far, the bird has only stayed aloft for 20 seconds at a time, but it has shown its capability as a spy already. AeroVironment doesn’t just want the little drone to fly like a bird but also to look like one. So it has been given another $2.1 million(By DARPA) to build a humming bot version 2.0.

[New Launches]

This video will tell you all about the US Air Force Research Laboratory’s computer generated vision of bird and insect-like Micro Air Vehicles (MAV) of the future. It includes such gems as a suicide MAV insect that can say, land on your neck and explode.

Of course they can also operate in swarms to survey large areas and double their killing fun and even deliver chemicals. These are all conceptual right now, but the future looks downright nasty. Who knows what will be buzzing around in our skies.

[Flightglobal]

We’ve talked about the Blackfin before in passing, now here you can have a look at it. The SRV-1 Blackfin is a fully assembled surveillance bot that you can control via the web with a Java-based console. It’s fully customizable with open source code and schematics. It looks like a lot of fun, whether you want to explore the terrain in yoiur home or outside.

[Thinkgeek] VIA [Theawesomer]

ALSOK is a Japanese electronics/security company that recently released An-9RR, a robotic pair built for security and receptionist tasks.
“Equipped with a camera and several sensors, the main unit (weight: 35kg) is able to recognize a visitor’s face or voice, take reservations, greet people and say goodbye. It also keeps records of people coming into the buildings it guards.”
These seem rather advanced for how cute they look. Though not very intimidating as security robots. Visitors can use the “parent” robot’s touchscreen interface to contact people or learn information about the building in which it’s located. The “kid” robot is smaller and can only be used for security purposes. These things might be cool but they won’t be scaring away any would-be intruders. The folks at ALSOK should talk to Boston Dynamics to see if they can get these security bots mounted on a could BigDogs. Yes, then my army would be marvelou—I mean…
AW CUTE!

[CrunchGear]

Can you believe these little things can fly? They are the size of a quarter and are amazing. Ilan Kroo and his colleagues at Stanford hope to one day use them for Mars exploration or atmospheric research.

Stanford’s funding came from DARPA, but their goal for the Mesicopter leaned more toward environmental surveillance than tactical. Swarms of the cheap bots could be used for collecting atmospheric data, or exploring Mars as well as other uses. Pretty amazing stuff.

[Neatorama]

I really, really thought this was fake when I first saw it. It’s a robot that can launch a net to capture intruders. Double-yeu tee eff. What’s more impressive than the ability to shoot a net is the fact that some company actually made this travesty of a security bot. Created, for some reason, by robot developer Tmsuk Co. Ltd. and security company Alacom Co. LtdIt, it’s called the T-34 and it’s loaded with sensors to detect any nettable guests.
Aside from being the robot equivalent of Spiderman’s wrist, the robot can be controlled via cell phone, and real-time images are transferred to the remote operator. Perhaps this redeeming feature makes it a useful as a surveillance robot. Unless this net is made of polonium-plated Kevlar, I can’t imagine the T-34 being actually able to capture anything except a hearty “haha wut” from its prey.

[AFP]

Like the Rovio, the WowWee Spyball spy camera will let you live out some James Bond fantasies. Or at the very least snap some upskirt pics. The tiny remote controlled robotic ball features built-in Wi-Fi connectivity and gets around on sleek wheels, capable of smooth mobility and quick 360-degree turns.

It can also transform from a ball to a camera and back within seconds, and it does it’s job quietly, so you can sneak around and get some dirt on people. The blackmail will follow. Another cool feature is that when it’s connected to a home network, the Spyball can be controlled remotely via the Internet.

I love it’s menacing death star type look. It looks like it has just spotted you and is about to take you out with a laser.

[Slipperybrick]

The “flying beer keg,” aka the Honeywell gas-powered Micro Air Vehicle, is operational and troops have been trained. Time to party. Well, no, it’s not really a beer keg after all. It’s a spybot that will be sent to Iraq to “hover and stare” at war zone hot spots.

It’s a well known fact that hovering and staring makes people nervous. But it also collects data. The reconnaissance keg uses fans to float in the sky almost silently and send back video. The gMAV is the first of many such drones that are being developed to fight the futuristic war while also reminding us of beer.

[wired]

Two students from Louisiana State University’s department of computer science know a couple fundamental facts about Americans: 1. We’re lazy, and 2. We don’t got a lotta dough right now to be throwing away on a different robot for each household job that needs to be done. To that end they’ve created a single robot that can be customized to perform a number of household duties. While your Roombas and Scoobas chug away with their specialized functions, LSU’s AgBot is able to do a range of things. Need a bot to mow the lawn? AgBot will raze those unruly blades. Need the same bot to keep your house under surveillance? Some minor tweaks and you’ve got a robot that has night vision, motion detection, an alarm, and the ability to email pictures of any home intruders.
S.S. Iyengar, chair of the computer science department, said, “What is most impressive about this robot is that it is multi-functional and no one else is currently designing multi-functional robots.” Well it’s a good thing somebody’s looking out for my desire to sleep 18 hours a day while a robot whirs about the house keeping things in order. “The ultimate goal for the AgBot is to be completely customizable. With minor adjustments, the robot can support five or six different applications including picking up mail, say the students.” What will the future bring? Ten applications? Twenty? It’s only a matter of time before Rosie is cooking me breakfast, I just hope the housekeeping robots of tomorrow don’t use the same brush for cleaning the silverware that they use to clean the bathroom…or do I?

[Wired]

It’s not infrequent that we see engineering imitating nature, and one of the latest robots to come to us via biomimicry is this robotic tuna. Boston Engineering and the Franklin W. Olin College of Engineering had researchers working on the GhostSwimmer project, which began as an MIT prototype called RoboTuna. The tuna is one of the fastest fish, and since GhostSwimmer emulates the tuna’s hydrodynamic motion, the robot is very fast as well. It can reach up to 70 kilometers per hour, just like a real tuna. The Navy was impressed with the bot’s speed and wants to use it as a spy vehicle (it can cover 3 times the distance of a typical UAV with the same battery) as well as a basis for future ultra-efficient submarine designs. Seems like it won’t be long till the Navy’s killing pirates in a Nautilus (Jules Verne style, not Fulton style). Now I’m gonna go make a tuna sandwich and hopefully not swallow any servo motors.

[io9]