Video Friday: Drones in Trees
Video Friday is your weekly selection of awesome robotics videos, collected by your friends at IEEE Spectrum robotics. We also post a weekly calendar of upcoming robotics events for the next few months. Please send us your events for inclusion.
Enjoy today's videos!
With the historic Kunming-Montreal Agreement of 18 December 2022, more than 200 countries agreed to halt and reverse biodiversity loss. But becoming nature-positive is an ambitious goal, also held back by the lack of efficient and accurate tools to capture snapshots of global biodiversity. This is a task where robots, in combination with environmental DNA (eDNA) technologies, can make a difference.
Our recent findings show a new way to sample surface eDNA with a drone, which could be helpful in monitoring biodiversity in terrestrial ecosystems. The eDrone can land on branches and collect eDNA from the bark using a sticky surface. The eDrone collected surface eDNA from the bark of seven different trees, and by sequencing the collected eDNA we were able to identify 21 taxa, including insects, mammals, and birds.
[ ETH Zurich ]
Thanks, Stefano!
How can we bring limbed robots into real-world environments to complete challenging tasks? Dr. Dimitrios Kanoulas and the team at UCL Computer Science's Robot Perception and Learning Lab are exploring how we can use autonomous and semi-autonomous robots to work in environments that humans cannot.
[ RPL UCL ]
Thanks, Dimitrios!
Bidirectional design, four-wheel steering, and a compact length give our robotaxi unique agility and freedom of movement in dense urban environments-or in games of tic-tac-toe. May the best robot win.
Okay, but how did they not end this video with one of the cars drawing a Z" off to the left side of the middle row?
[ Zoox ]
Thanks, Whitney!
DEEP Robotics wishes y'all happy, good health in the year of the rabbit!
Binkies!
[ Deep Robotics ]
This work presents a safety-critical locomotion-control framework for quadrupedal robots. Our goal is to enable quadrupedal robots to safely navigate in cluttered environments.
[ Hybrid Robotics ]
At 360.50 kilometers per hour, this is the world speed record for a quadrotor.
[ Quad Star Drones ] via [ Gizmodo ]
When it rains, it pours-and we're designing the Waymo Driver to handle it. See how shower tests, thermal chambers, and rugged tracks at our closed-course facilities ensure our system can navigate safely, no matter the forecast.
[ Waymo ]
You know what's easier than picking blueberries? Picking greenberries, which are much less squishy.
[ Sanctuary AI ]
The Official Wrap-Up of ABU ROBOCON 2022 New Delhi, India.
[ ROBOCON ]