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Robotics has been on a steady climb every since
its birth in the early Twentieth Century. Yet, the industry will most
definitely continue to grow at an ever increasing pace into the near, and
far, future, in the four main areas. These areas are space and sea
exploration, medical advances, and industrial and home automation. With
the ever-increasing desire to find new lands, resources, or habitable
planets, robotics is one of the key technologies that is increasing this
search. Just recently, in 1997, NASA landed a robotic vehicle on the
surface of Mars to explore and study the planet for water and other
materials necessary for life. The Pathfinder mission was hugely successful
and collected large amounts of information to study. The Mars Pathfinder
was a robot similar to Dante II. It had the "smarts" to
negotiate itself around the Martian landscape while receiving its orders
from earth. The other large area of exploration is Earth’s oceans. The
inky darkness and crushing pressure of the ocean depths makes it mostly
unreachable for humans. The perfect place for a world modeling robot. For
instance, a robot could be programmed to cruse the ocean depths in search
of information. When its power cells ran dry, it could then surface to
recharge its self using solar panels. It would then dive down again, all
the while transmitting it position, depth, and any other vital information
back to land where it is recorded. This type of robot could just run
freely until it eventually fell apart from old age, but all its
information would be stored on land, right at the fingertips of the
scientists.
If a robot can be sent to Mars, or the depths of
the ocean, why can it be sent into a human body? Many scientists are
working on shrinking the size of a robot to actually fit into a human
body. A robot like this could walk down the patient’s mouth, or even be
directly injected into the blood stream. Once in the blood stream, the
robot could cruse around with the flow of blood. If an obstruction was
detected, it could then cut or drill
away the obstruction. Why not have tens of little
robots floating around in your body destroying cancer cells, monitoring
blood pressure, pulse, artery clogging, etc. Although this sounds far
fetched, if may be just around the corner.
So if robotics takes over our exploration and if
robots are able to perform medical operations, then they certainly will
start to run our industries. Imagine a robotic restaurant. Robotic
waiters, cooks, and cleaners. Already, many plants have very few human
workers, and even these numbers will certainly be dropped into the near
future. Or how about a robotic grocery store? When you pick up to
purchase, a scanner in the cart automatically adds it to your bill, and
deducts it from the store inventory. A computer then places an order for
more of your purchase to keep up a stock. You then go and get your meat,
from the robotic meat chopper, while a robotic "employee"
restocks the tomatoes.
After "taking over" our exploration,
medicine, and industries, the next logical area is our homes. At the
mention of a house robot, many people envision something along the
lines of "Rosy" from the cartoon The
Jetsons. Although this might be affective, most likely, the house of the
future will have a number of specific task achieving robots. What about a
robotic vacuum cleaner? Mondo-Tronics sells a robot named Cye which is
programmed from a person’s computer to clean floors, with a vacuum
cleaner attachment. Eureka has developed a robot vacuum cleaner called a
trilobite. If placed in a room with the doors closed, an hour later, the
floor will be clean (Louderback). A robotic kitchen could tell one how to
fix a certain dish. Or the kitchen might tell when one’s turkey is done.
The above examples are just scratching the surface of how robotics could
affect our lives in the future.
The history of robotics from its early origins in
the 1700’s till now, has been filled with bumps and even crashes, but
robotics is here to stay. Many colleges have large laboratories devoted to
robotics, and they continue to pump out more and more new innovations. The
American culture’s fascination for robotics seems to be pulling away
from television and into the realm of reality, as our culture sees what
this robotic revolution can do for people. Although the robotics
industry has had its ups and downs, robotics is here to stay, and will
continue to influence our lives and economy into the future.
Dowling, Kevin "Robotics FAQ." Aug. 19,
1996: On-line. Internet. Available at
http://www.frc.ri.cmu.edu/robotics-faq/.
Louderback, Jim. "ZDNet News." June 7,
1999: On-line. Internet. Available at
http://www.zdnet.com/news.
Flynn, Anita M. and Jones, Joseph L. Mobile
Robots: Inspiration to Implementation.
1993 - A.K. Peters Ltd.
"Robots" Microsoft Encarta ’95.
CD-ROM. Microsoft Corporation. 1994.
Vincent, Donald A. "The Robotics
Industry." Article. On-line. Available at
http://www.robotics.org.
Wickelgren, Ingrid "Ramblin’
Robots." Venture Books 1996.
"Robot" World Book Encyclopedia. Pages
347-348. 1982 ed.
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