TEAM DUCT TAPE

From Carnegie Mellon’s Robotics Academy blog:
PITTSBURGH—A new four-year, $7 million educational initiative by Carnegie Mellon University will leverage students’ innate interest in robots and other forms of “hard fun” to increase U.S. enrollments in computer science and steer more young people into scientific and technological careers.
The initiative, called Fostering Innovation through Robotics Exploration (FIRE), is [...]

A post at Evil Mad Scientist Laboratories about the Egg-Bot heading out to the Maker Faire in Detroit, caught our interest.  
The Egg-Bot “  is an open-source art robot that can draw on spherical or egg-shaped objects from the size of a ping pong ball size to that of a small grapefruit– roughly 1.5 to 4 inches [...]

Tufts University and Virginia Tech collaborated on an interesting study that has implications in robot locomotion ( Gut Movements in Caterpillars Have Impact on Robotic Design):
BLACKSBURG, Va., July 23, 2010 – Weird movements in the abdomens of freely crawling caterpillars are making headlines in the fields of engineering and biology, says Jake Socha, Virginia Tech assistant [...]

Interesting look at the new Samantha module and Samomoto, a (free!) app that allows wifi control of a robot via the Samantha module, emulating  standard game controller hardware:

When TDT visited Georgia Tech, we saw Aldebaran robots used for work with special needs children.  An article in today’s St. Petersburg Times, which originally appeared in the New York Times (A Soft Spot for Circuitry), talks about growing use of “robot therapy“ in environments ranging from nursing homes, to substance abuse counseling to diet coaching. 
Paro is a [...]

Check out U.S. Secretary of Education, Arne Duncan, driving Skunkworks FRC robot during a visit to Aviation High School in DesMoines.   It was a strained visit, as Race to the Top funds are on the line, but Duncan said he was impressed by Aviation High School and “ would like to see a hundred more schools [...]

Taking robotic competitions to the next level, teams of Aldebaran robots (like the one we met at the FIRST World Championship in Atlanta in April), competed in a soccer match at the Robot World Cup in Singapore.
From The Engineer:
500 teams from over 40 countries took part in Robocup 2010, in a variety of tournaments ranging from [...]