Automatica 2016: visit the ECHORD++ booth in hall B4, stand 317
What does it take to bring robots from the lab to the market? Well, if you ask us, it’s a close collaboration of industry and academia, a good sense of the user’s needs and, of course, money for research and development. At Automatica fair 2016, the leading trade fair for industrial automation and mechatronics, seven research projects funded under the umbrella of ECHORD++ will present the results of their work at our booth in hall B4, stand 317. With application areas like agriculture, healthcare, construction and industry, visitors of our booth can experience the enormous versatility of present-day robots.
In particular, we will showcase the following projects:
MARS (Mobile Agricultural Robot Swarms)
Planting corn with cloud-controlled swarm robots is the idea behind the project MARS. The MARS robots are ready for operation all around the clock, their light weight leads to a high level of safety and negligible soil compaction, especially compared to the one of large tractors.
GARotics (Green asparagus harvesting robotic system)
GARotics will improve the automatic harvesting systems for green asparagus by enhancing the quality of the asparagus detection and by increasing the detection rate as well as the harvesting rate. Therefore, GARotics will take a major step forward towards the introduction of autonomous harvesting aids.
Pickit (Multi-modal bin-picking for new industrial tasks)
In factories, randomly stored material in bins is a very cost-effective and flexible supply form. Pickit introduces a tactile sensor which can be attached to any desirable gripper to overcome limitations of current bin-picking systems. This solution will make bin-picking faster, more precise and more reliable. The use of tactile sensing opens up new application areas making the system applicable for objects with dark, shiny or semi-transparent surfaces as well.
Robots are rather rare to find on construction sites, but this could change with the introduction of Flooring Fellow. This co-working robot will assist pavers in removing grout after tiling. The robot will decrease the risk of an electric shock for construction workers and expose them to less noise and vibration than current machinery.
EXOTrainer introduces wearable gait exoskeletons for the therapy of children affected by Spinal Muscular Atrophy (SMA), a genetic disease leading to muscle wasting and mobility impairment. There is still no cure for SMA, therefore treatments focus on maintaining the physical state of the patient and on attempting to delay the onset of side effects like a deformation of the spine and the loss of range of motion. Walking is the key to retard the evolution of these side effects and EXOTrainer is expected to provide an improved therapy approach through wearable gait exoskeletons.
MODUL (Modular Drive Units for Legged Locomotion)
First, MODUL focuses on developing a so-called series elastic actuation (SEA) unit, a motor for certain robot parts, which will be modular and suited for outdoor operation. The main benefit of the unit is its ability to control the torque used and its robustness against impacts. The second target is to develop a modular, four-legged transporter, simple to operate, maintain and upgrade, with a high relative payload and speed to be used for example on offshore oil and gas platforms.
MOTORE++ (A new Rehabilitation Robot for the upper limb: refinement and experimental trials)
The goal of MOTORE++ is to develop a rehabilitation robot for restoring upper limb functionality, for example for patients affected by a stroke. The robot works without any links or wire and it is small enough to be easily carried and as such suitable for in-home rehabilitation.
Image source: zen-foto / flickr. Attribution-NoDerivs 2.0 Generic license (CC BY-ND 2.0). See https://www.flickr.com/photos/wygiwys/2532974269/ for the original picture.
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