Featured series 
Tag: Robots
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Nation & World
Meat and muscles, sure. But the human eye is a stretch, for now.
The author and MIT professor Ritu Raman discussed the promise and ethical challenges of a lab-shaped future.
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Nation & World
Great promise but potential for peril
Harvard experts examine the promise and potential pitfalls as AI takes a bigger decision-making role in more industries.
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Nation & World
A soft touch
A new rubber computer combines the feel of a human hand with the thought process of a traditional computer, replacing the last hard components in soft robots. Now, soft robotics can travel where metals and electronics cannot — high-radiation disaster areas, outer space, and deep underwater — and turn invisible to the naked eye or…
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Nation & World
Soft multifunctional robots get really small
A team of researchers has created a soft, animal-inspired robot that can safely be deployed in difficult-to-access environments, such as in delicate surgical procedures in the human body.
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Nation & World
The robots are coming, but relax
As artificial intelligence takes hold in more fields, you’ll likely have a job, analysts say, but it may be a different one.
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Nation & World
From drinking straws to robots
Inspired by arthropod insects and spiders, scientists George Whitesides and Alex Nemiroski have created a type of semi-soft robot capable of walking, using drinking straws, and inflatable tubing. The team was even able to create a robotic water strider capable of pushing itself along the water’s surface.
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Nation & World
Robotic insect mimics nature’s extreme moves
A team of researchers from Harvard and Seoul National University has unveiled a novel robotic insect that can jump off the surface of water. In doing so, they have revealed new insights into the natural mechanics that allow water striders to jump from rigid ground or fluid water with the same amount of power and…
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Nation & World
Reader favorites for 2014
In 2014, the Harvard Gazette featured major news from the University. From treatments for diabetes and depression to snapshots of Commencement, the Gazette captured the essence of the Harvard community.
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Nation & World
Build your own bot
A new resource provides both experienced and aspiring researchers with the intellectual raw materials needed to design, build, and operate robots made from soft, flexible materials.
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Nation & World
The 1,000-robot swarm
Harvard researchers create a swarm of 1,000 tiny robots that, upon command, can autonomously combine to form requested shapes — a significant advance in artificial intelligence.
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Nation & World
Robot folds up, walks away
A team of engineers used little more than paper and a classic children’s toy to build a robot that assembles itself into a complex shape in four minutes, and crawls away without human intervention.
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Nation & World
Robots to the rescue
Inspired by termites’ resilience and collective intelligence, a team of computer scientists and engineers at the Harvard School of Engineering and Applied Sciences and the Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering at Harvard University has created an autonomous robotic construction crew. The system needs no supervisor, just simple robots that cooperate.
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Nation & World
Airmail, to your door
Harvard engineering Professor Robert Wood lends his perspective to Amazon’s proposal to start a flying drone delivery service within a few years. His verdict is that FAA regulations and liability concerns will likely be bigger hurdles than the technology.
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Nation & World
Robotic insects make first controlled flight
The demonstration of the first controlled flight of an insect-sized robot is the culmination of more than a decade’s work, led by researchers at the Harvard School of Engineering and Applied Sciences and the Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering at Harvard.
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Nation & World
Robot hands gain a gentler touch
Researchers at the Harvard School of Engineering and Applied Sciences have developed an inexpensive tactile sensor for robotic hands that is sensitive enough to turn a brute machine into a dexterous manipulator.
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Nation & World
Using explosions to power soft robots
Using small explosions produced by a mix of methane and oxygen, researchers at Harvard have designed a soft robot that can leap as much as a foot in the air.
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Nation & World
Robots with lift
Using small explosions produced by a mix of methane and oxygen, researchers at Harvard have designed a soft robot that can leap as much as a foot in the air. That ability to jump could one day prove critical in allowing the robots to avoid obstacles during search and rescue operations.
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Nation & World
Soft robots go for color, camouflage
Researchers have developed a system — inspired by nature — that allows soft robots to either camouflage themselves against a background, or to make bold color displays. Such a “dynamic coloration” system could one day have a host of uses, ranging from helping doctors plan complex surgeries to acting as a visual marker to help…
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Nation & World
Soft Robots, in color
Having already broken new ground in robotics with the development, last year, of a class of “soft”, silicone-based robots based on creatures like squid and octopi, Harvard scientists are now working to create systems that would allow the robots to camouflage themselves, or stand out in their environment.
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Nation & World
Soft-bots
Harvard Professor George Whitesides and his research team have developed an array of “soft” robots based on natural forms, including squids and starfish, that may one day be used to aid disaster recovery efforts by squeezing into the rubble left by an earthquake to locate survivors, or as a way to free up a surgeon’s…
