Printable Robots Featured on Science Nation

Professor Daniela Rus, director of CSAIL, is leading a movement to revolutionize our access to robots. With help from the National Science Foundation’s (NSF) Expeditions in Computing Program, Rus and her team in the Distributed Robotics Lab at CSAIL are developing a new process through which the average person could design, customize and print a specialized robot in a matter of hours.
 
In a new video featured on Science Nation, Rus explains how her team is developing a platform that would allow an individual to identify a household problem that needs assistance, then head to a local printing store to select a blueprint from a library of robotic designs, and then customize an easy-to-use robotic device that could solve the problem.  The team has already produced several printable robots, including SEG, an origami-inspired Segway robot, and a small robot that can pinch and grasp objects, which might prove useful to a person on crutches or someone in a wheelchair.
 
“My goal is to make robots more capable and more autonomous,” said Rus in the Science Nation video. “In other words to bring machines into everyday life in such a way that our lives will be improved and enhanced by these machines.”
 
Read more about Rus’ work with printable robots here: http://www.csail.mit.edu/node/1717.