(16 Apr 2017) LEADIN:
Could robots be the future of caring for the elderly or the disabled?
A UK-based company has developed a smart robotic pet that uses artificial intelligence to interact with humans.?
STORYLINE:
Meet MiRo, a biomimetic robot that's on a mission to make friends.
Developed by experts at the University of Sheffield, it's intended to be used in various environments, but particularly as a companion, perhaps for the elderly or maybe for people with disabilities.
It's creators, Consequential Robotics, believe that in the future social robots will share our personal space, constantly interacting with us and providing emotional engagement.
With that in mind, they might as well look cute too.
MiRo is claimed to be the world's first commercial biomimetic robot. Its name is short for 'mimetic robot'.
"So this is MiRo, he is a biomimetic robot. As you can see, you can't really tell if it's a dog, or a sheep, or a cow, it's a hybrid animal," explains studio manager with Consequential Robotics, Maria Favre.
"It has a companionship effect so when it's on and around you it really gives you that warm, buzzy feeling that you have someone that understands you, it kind of can really help for loneliness, but also autism, people with learning disabilities."
MiRo is fitted with various sensors, meaning it can "feel" a stroke on its head or back.
Its tactile perception and mood regulation systems then allow it to respond accordingly with expressive behaviour, such as tail wagging.
It also has smart stereo cameras built into its eyes which allow it to recognise people and follow their movements.
Its nose houses a sonar sensor, meaning it can use echolocation like a bat to sense its position.
MiRo is also equipped with a cliff sensor that helps it stop when it encounters a steep drop.
But when the aim is to interact with humans, why build an animal rather than a humanoid?
Mechatronics engineer Ludwig Resch says robotics has reached a stage where animal droids can be convincing, whereas human-looking robots are still a long way off.
"The interesting thing it's at an animal level, but if you were to design a humanoid robot, you can't meet the expectations of customers. So we go for an animal level," he says.
"And interestingly we're at the point where we can start doing more with that higher level thinking and the artful intelligence."
But, modern advancements in artificial intelligence and programming are allowing engineers to go further than the average pet.
It's envisaged that MiRo could use AI to perform a variety of useful tasks, such as recognising visitors at the front door or reminding owners of events in their diary.
MiRo could be used to make audio calls or perhaps raise the alarm in the event of an accident.
"With artificial intelligence, it opens doors to a whole range of new things," explains Resch.
"If it was just an animal, you would be pretty much stuck at that animal level, that ability to interact emotionally, but since we have the artificial level and that high level thinking brain, we can do things that animals couldn't.
"We can recognise people based on voice, we can recognise them based on visual signs and this means we can open MiRo's applications to a whole range."
A recent Oxford University study estimated that 47 percent of jobs in the United States are "at risk" of being automated in the next 20 years.
But could a carer be one of those?
"I think they have a place," says Mervyn Kohler from UK-based charity Age UK.
But Kohler says for now robotics shouldn't be seen as a replacement, but an "add-on."
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