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Robo-pet

Ever wanted a pet, but without the hassle of training or cleaning up after it? Well ‘Probo’ could be for you!

This robotic companion has an artificial optical skin, which can detect touch and respond accordingly. Probo is so clever that it can differentiate between different types of touching such as tickling, poking, slapping and petting and reacts with the appropriate facial expressions and noises.

The designers hope that Probo could be used to comfort hospitalized children who often have long periods in quarantine conditions where a real pet would be inappropriate.

The flexible skin-like foil was created by the Polymer Chemistry and Biomaterials Research Group at the Universiteit Gent, who teamed up with the Robotics and Multibody Mechanics Research Group of the Vrije Universiteit Brussel, both in Belgium. The ‘skin’ is composed of optical fibre sensors embedded in flexible silicon, which is supple enough to allow the robot to move, but strong enough to protect the fibre from damage (against slapping presumably).

Posted by Marie Freebody on April 11, 2008 12:05 PM | Permalink