Thursday, June 07, 2007

Robot BEAR

The BBC News Health section today reported on the development of a mobile robot by the US army designed to carry battlefield casualties back to safety. Named the Battlefield Extraction Assist Robot (BEAR), it apparently has a "friendly appearance" to put wounded soldiers at ease. It's not an autonomous robot, with a human operator required, but the construction seems quite impressive - capable of travel over rough terrain, and even stair climbing, whilst carrying people.
As the picture shows, what attracted me to the story was the somewhat uncanny resemblance this machine has to Johnny 5, of Short Circuit fame... :-)

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