Boston Dynamics continues to surprise: now its robots do somersaults

Boston Dynamics has released a new video demonstrating the capabilities of its already popular Atlas bipedal robot. Writes about it ITC.

Photo: IStock

In the video, the robot overcomes obstacles to deliver a bag of tools to a construction worker. The video ends with a demonstration of the acrobatic abilities of the robot, which can do somersaults and successfully land.

Atlas team leader Scott Quindersma said the video was meant to inform the expansion of research that is being done with Atlas. It is important that the videos are carefully planned and structured, and the crashes and errors are edited. But as Kuindersma points out, these are significant changes for Atlas.

On the subject: Boston Dynamics robots passed the obstacle course: they did a great job

“We're not just thinking about how to make a robot move dynamically in its environment,” Quindersma said. “Now we’re starting to put Atlas to work and think about how the robot should be able to perceive and manipulate objects in its environment.”

It should be noted that this is a significant change in the communication of the company. She had never previously noted how her two-legged machines could be used in the workplace.

Now Boston Dynamics only sells two robots: Stretch and Spot. Stretch is a wheeled machine with a huge arm designed to move crates in warehouses. Spot is a four-legged robot that is mainly used to perform surveillance and inspection tasks as a remote camera or mapping tool using 3D scanners. But Quindersma explains that the bipedal, two-handed robot can perform many tasks that other robots can't.

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“A humanoid robot would be well suited for jobs like manufacturing, factory work, construction—places where the humanoid form factor would actually fit very well with its ambidextrous design, its ability to stand upright, move heavy objects, and work in traditional human spaces,” - he explained.

In a blog post, Atlas' head of operations, Ben Stevens, noted that we are still a long way from bipedal robots that can reliably work alongside humans. There is still a lot of work to be done, but already now you can get an idea where the company is heading.

As ForumDaily wrote earlier:

• At the end of 2020, Boston Dynamics shared a New Year's Eve dancing robot video. In this video, four Boston Dynamics robots of three different types perform a joint dance to the popular 1962 musical composition Do You Love Me by The Contours. The dance begins with two Atlas humanoid robots, then the robot dog Spot joins them, and at the end of the performance, the wheeled robot Handle.

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