Engelberg is one of the most famous robotics experts in the world. He founded Unimation company in 1958 and developed the world's first industrial robot in 1959. He made outstanding contributions to the establishment of the robot industry. 1983, when the sales of industrial robots became increasingly popular, engelberg and his colleagues resolutely bought Unimation Company into Westinghouse Company, founded TRC Company, and began to develop service robots.
Engelberg believes that service robots are closely related to people's lives, and the application of service robots will continuously improve people's quality of life, which is also the goal that people pursue. Once the service robot is accepted by people like other electromechanical products and enters thousands of households, its market will be limitless.
The first service robot product of TRC company founded by engelberg is a "nurse assistant" robot for hospitals. 1985 development, 1990 sales, has been put into use in dozens of hospitals around the world. Nurse Assistant is not only for sale, but also for rent. Because we are optimistic about the market prospect of "Nurse Assistant", we set up a robot company named "Nurse Assistant", and its chairman is engelberg.
"Nurse Assistant" is an autonomous robot. It does not require wired guidance or pre-planning. Once programmed, it can complete the following tasks at any time: delivering medical equipment and equipment, delivering meals to patients, delivering medical records, statements and letters, delivering medicines, delivering test samples and test results, and delivering mail and parcels in hospitals.
The robot consists of a walking part, a driving controller and a large number of sensors. The robot can move freely in the hospital at a speed of about 0.7 m/s, and the robot is equipped with the architectural drawing of the hospital. After the destination is determined, the robot can use the path push algorithm to navigate autonomously along the corridor. Structured light vision sensor and omni-directional ultrasonic sensor can detect static or moving objects and correct the route. Its omni-directional tactile sensor ensures that the robot will not collide with people and things. The encoder on the wheel measures the distance it has traveled. In the corridor, the robot uses the corner to determine its position, while in the large space such as the ward, it can use the reflective tape on the ceiling to help locate by looking up at the sensor. It can also open the door when necessary. In a multi-storey building, it can call a manned elevator and enter the elevator to reach the required floor. For example, in an emergency, when the surgeon and his patient use the elevator, the robot can stop to make way. After 2 minutes, it will restart and move on. You can select multiple destinations through the Nurse Assistant menu. The robot has a large screen and humanized audio equipment, which is quick and convenient for users to use. In the early spring of 2000, a student of a university in Heilongjiang was lying quietly on the operating table of the PLA Navy General Hospital. She has craniopharyngioma. She had a craniotomy four years ago. Unfortunately, the tumor has recurred now. The tumor compressed the optic nerve and reduced her binocular vision. The left eye vision is 0.02, and the right eye vision is only light. At the moment, doctors are using advanced brain surgery robot system to locate her operation. I saw four landmarks on her head, which established a spatial coordinate system. The CT machine scanned her from different angles. After that, the doctor entered 9 CT images into the computer, and the three-dimensional lesion was displayed on the screen. The doctor determines the puncture point and trajectory of the operation on the screen, and the robot with 5 degrees of freedom aims at the puncture point, and then locks this position by itself, so as to build a stable operation platform for the doctor, who can insert the needle according to the calibrated puncture point and perform the corresponding operation. The whole operation lasted for 20 minutes. After the operation, the patient got out of bed, put on his shoes and walked out of the operating room. Three days later, the patient was discharged and his eyes recovered to 0.9.
Robot-aided system for brain surgery
The robot-aided system for brain surgery is jointly developed by Beihang University, Tsinghua University and the Navy General Hospital. 1May, 997, the robot performed the first craniotomy for patients. By 20001October, it had performed craniotomy for 140 patients. In June, 2000, 1 1, an academic exchange meeting on clinical application of medical robots was held in Beijing. On the morning of June 5438+May 5, American cardiac surgery robot and China brain surgery robot performed clinical operations respectively. After disinfection, three small holes were punched in the chest, and the manipulator reached into the chest. In the operating room on the fourth floor, robots from the United States began to perform coronary artery bypass surgery on a 59-year-old patient. This mechanical arm named Aesop reached into the chest and moved within the range of 0.2 to 1 cm under the instructions of the doctor "up, down, left and right" to find the internal mammary artery for bridging. Mr. Zhang, vice president of American Robotic Arm Development Company, said that it takes 45 minutes to take the internal mammary artery by traditional surgery, but it can be completed by using a robotic arm in about 15 minutes. If this kind of operation is not adopted, the patient will leave a 20 cm long incision. Because there is an endoscope on the mechanical arm, the doctor's vision is clearer and he can operate directly on the surgical image. This time, the incision in the patient's chest was only 5 cm. In the operating room on the second floor, China Robot is doing a brain biopsy for Ms. Wang, who is 6 1 year old. The chief surgeon, Mr. Zhao, said that for extracranial surgery with deep lesions like Ms. Wang, four nails should be stuck in the skull, a large metal frame should be put on, and CT and MRI scans should be done everywhere. With the help of the mechanical arm, the patient can throw away the big frame and locate it with the help of the mechanical arm to provide the doctor with a surgical platform. Through the computer screen next to the operating table, the doctor can determine the focus of the operation. Operations that used to take at least half a day to complete are now completed in 30 minutes. The operation started at 9 o'clock, and before 10, Ms. Wang walked off the operating table easily. Ms. Wang smiled and said, "My brain is much looser." Professor Tian Zengmin, one of the developers of assisted surgical robots, said that the development trend of neurosurgery is to pursue safety, minimally invasive and accuracy. The use of robot systems meets these requirements and has achieved unparalleled good results in minimally invasive treatment. Before the robot system was used, stereotactic brain surgery with frame was widely used at home and abroad, that is, four small holes were drilled in the patient's skull and then a metal frame was fixed. Doctors use this frame (that is, a coordinate system) to determine the specific location of lesions and determine the location of surgery. Using this robot system, not only the pain caused by the fixing frame to the patient and the inconvenience caused to the doctor are eliminated, but also the positioning accuracy and the visibility of the operation are improved, and the surgical trauma is minimized for the patient.
Robots are used more and more in medical treatment, such as replacing hip bones with robots and performing chest surgery with robots. This is mainly because the robot has high precision and little trauma, which greatly reduces the pain of patients. Judging from the development trend of robots in the world, it will be an inevitable trend to use robots to assist surgery. Teeth are the protectors of human health, and having a solid and complete tooth is the guarantee of good health. But as people get older, their teeth will loosen and fall off. At present, most developed countries in the world have entered an aging society, and many elderly people have lost their teeth. Patients with complete tooth loss are called edentulous jaws and need to be repaired with complete dentures. At present, there are nearly120,000 edentulous patients in China. Artificial dentition is the key to restore mastication, language function and facial beauty of edentulous patients, and it is also the technical core and difficulty of making complete denture. The traditional method of making complete denture is made by doctors and technicians according to the shape of the patient's jaw, which can no longer meet the growing social needs. Peking University Stomatological Hospital, Beijing Institute of Technology and other units jointly developed a dental prosthesis robot.
Prosthetic robot
This is an applied experimental system for the design and manufacture of complete denture artificial dentition aided by computer and robot. The system uses image and graphics technology to obtain the computer model of oral soft and hard tissues of edentulous patients, uses the non-contact three-dimensional laser scanning measurement system developed by ourselves to obtain the geometric parameters of edentulous jaws, and uses expert system software to complete the computer-aided statistics of artificial dentition of complete denture. In addition, an adjustable tooth arrangement device is invented and manufactured, which is a transitional device between a single plastic artificial tooth and the final artificial dentition.
Based on this robot, the arbitrary position and posture control of tooth arrangement can be realized. The use of prosthodontics robot is equivalent to rapidly training and bringing up a group of senior prosthodontics medical experts and technicians. Using robots instead of manual tooth arrangement can not only perform digital operation more accurately than dentists, but also avoid mistakes caused by fatigue, emotion and negligence. This will make the design and manufacture of complete denture meet the individual physiological function and aesthetic needs of edentulous patients, and reach the level of standardization, standardization, automation and industrialization, thus greatly improving its manufacturing efficiency and quality. At a press conference held in Los Angeles, participants saw such a set of shots on the projection screen: subtitles:
One day in 2005, a small robot assembled by gears with a diameter of only 30 microns was implanted into blood vessels. This little robot swims freely in the river of blood like a submarine. Once they encounter cholesterol and fat deposited or floating in blood vessels, they will pounce on them mercilessly and quickly tear them up and chew them up. They stood up without fear when they met the vicious virus.
However, the virus is very cunning. When they see each other's fierceness, they often pretend to be timid and pathetic, as if they have surrendered. Or simply lie down, motionless, seems to have become a zombie. Robots are kind and generous. They strode past these enemies who laid down their weapons.
However, the virus that received preferential treatment did not stop there. After the robot passed by, they jumped up and began to attack the robot from behind, and the robot kept falling down.
Don't worry, these robots have error correction programs in them. Many of them can automatically adjust their behavior after suffering losses, as long as it is not a glorious sacrifice. Therefore, robots are no longer honest. When they see the virus, no matter how well they disguise it, they must kill it.
Viruses also improvise. When they meet robots, they try their best to enlarge their bodies, bluff and pretend to be fierce. However, robots with "super brave" programs hidden in their brains are fearless and determined to defend their owners' health with their own lives. So the robot and the virus launched a fierce struggle. Finally, the virus was constantly annihilated. Fragments of the virus are constantly oozing from the blood vessels, flowing into the kidneys and being excreted through urine. Therefore, the arteries are unobstructed and the human body is healthier.
The above plot about ultramicro technology is fabricated according to scientists' ideas, but it is not an impossible dream. With the development of MEMS technology, fantasy is coming to reality step by step.
1On May 27th, 988, two China students from the University of California developed a micromotor with only 76 microns (3‰ inches).
199 1 year 1 1 month, researchers from Japan Electronics Company arranged silicon atoms into a pyramid-shaped "concave pyramid" with an ultra-fine needle tip under the most advanced "electron tunneling scanning microscope" at that time, with a height of only 36 atoms. This is the first time that human beings have arranged atoms by hand, which has caused a sensation in the field of atomic physics in the world.
1In July 1996, Harvard University successfully developed a turbine with a diameter of only 7 microns. Thousands of such turbines can be placed on a stamp. Its shape and structure can only be seen clearly under the ultra-high power microscope. China also developed the 1mm motor.
Ultramicro technology is not closely related to ordinary people now, mainly because it is not practical. In this regard, Dr. Benjamin King, an expert in modern superphysics at Stanford University in the United States, described it this way: "In the future, people will develop highly intelligent artificial fleas, spiders and other animals. They integrate ultramicro computers, drivers, transmission devices, sensors and power supplies, and become very unique and effective assistants for human beings. They will be widely used in medical, agricultural, industrial, aerospace, military and other fields. In addition to the function of injecting blood vessels to remove poisons, micro-motors can also be used to suture nerves, microvessels and eyeballs in surgery. It can also be used to go deep into human internal organs, such as kidneys and hearts, for examination. Thousands of "flea" robots will be moved into farmland to eliminate pests, make agriculture harvest, and prevent environmental pollution caused by the use of pesticides ... "With the development of society and the improvement of human civilization, people, especially the disabled, increasingly need to use modern high technology to improve their quality of life and freedom of life. Because of various traffic accidents, natural and man-made disasters and various diseases, thousands of people lose one or more abilities (such as walking and hands-on ability) every year. Therefore, the research on robot wheelchair for helping disabled people walk has gradually become a hot spot. For example, in Spain and Italy, the Institute of Automation of the Chinese Academy of Sciences has also successfully developed a robot wheelchair with visual and password navigation functions and interactive voice with people.
Robot wheelchair mainly has the functions of password recognition and speech synthesis, robot self-positioning, dynamic random obstacle avoidance, multi-sensor information fusion, real-time adaptive navigation control and so on.
The key technology of robot wheelchair is safe navigation. The basic methods used are ultrasonic and infrared ranging, and some are password-controlled. The main deficiency of ultrasonic and infrared navigation lies in the limited controllable range, and visual navigation can overcome this deficiency. In the robot wheelchair, the wheelchair user should be the center and active part of the whole system. For users, the robot wheelchair should have the function of interacting with people. This interactive function can be realized intuitively through man-machine voice dialogue. Although some existing mobile wheelchairs can be controlled by simple passwords, there are few mobile robots and wheelchairs with real interactive functions. Cable-stayed bridge is more and more favored by bridge designers because of its beautiful appearance and good seismic performance. Since the Tshomsonte cable-stayed bridge was built in Sweden in 1956, there have been more than 300 cable-stayed bridges in the world by 1993. Since 1975 built the first cable-stayed bridge in Yunyang, Sichuan, more than 40 cable-stayed bridges have been built so far.
Cable is the main stress component of cable-stayed bridge, but its surface will be seriously damaged by long-term exposure to the atmosphere and erosion by wind, rain and environmental pollution, which will bring adverse effects to the whole cable-stayed bridge. Therefore, it is very necessary to maintain the cable effectively. Cable-stayed bridge attracts many tourists with its unique shape, adding a beautiful landscape to modern cities. However, while people marvel at the spectacular cable-stayed bridge, they also find that most of the cables of the cable-stayed bridge are black, and the monotony of color affects the charm of the cable-stayed bridge. Therefore, in recent years, colorful cable-stayed bridges have become the goal pursued by many bridge experts.
At present, there are three methods for color cable-stayed bridges, namely, color wrapping method, all-material coloring method and color painting method, among which color painting method is the most economical and flexible method. Up to now, there are two main methods for color painting of cables of cable-stayed bridges at home and abroad. One is to paint the cable by using the hydraulic lifting platform of small cable-stayed bridge, and the other is to paint the cable by using the pre-installed fixed point at the top of the tower, and to transport workers along the cable by using the steel wire supporting hanging basket. The work scope of the former method is very limited, and the latter method is widely used in many cable-stayed bridges. However, painting by hand at high altitude is not only inefficient and costly, but also dangerous, especially in rainy days. Therefore, in 1997, the Robot Research Institute of Shanghai Jiaotong University cooperated with the Shanghai Huangpu River Bridge Engineering Construction Office to develop the cable painting and maintenance robot prototype of the cable-stayed bridge.
The robot system consists of two parts, one is the robot body, and the other is the robot car. The robot body can climb along cables with various inclinations, and automatically complete a series of maintenance work such as inspection, polishing, cleaning, static removal, bottom coating and top coating of overhead cables. The robot is equipped with a CCD camera, which can monitor the working situation at any time. The other part of the ground vehicle is used to install the robot body, supply water and paint to the robot body, and monitor the high-altitude work of the robot.
Robots have the following functions:
Climbing function along the cable
Robots can climb along cables with any inclination. The height of the climbable cable is160m, and the cable inclination is 0 ~ 90 (the cable diameter is 90 ~ 200mm, and the climbing speed of the robot is 8m/s. ..
Cable detection function
The robot is equipped with a wire rope detection system, which can detect whether the wire rope breaks along the cable, so as to replace the cable in time.
Cable cleaning function
The robot body is equipped with various shapes of cleaning brushes and special water-based cleaning liquid, which can complete the work of cable dust removal, degreasing and static electricity removal on the polyethylene surface.
Have a certain intelligence
The robot has a good man-machine interaction function, and can judge whether to climb to the top, the wind power at high altitude and other environmental conditions, and implement corresponding actions. With the modernization of the city, high-rise buildings have sprung up. In order to be beautiful and get better lighting effect, many office buildings and hotels have adopted glass curtain walls, which brings the problem of cleaning glass windows. In fact, not only the glass windows, but also the walls made of other materials need to be cleaned regularly.
For a long time, the cleaning of exterior walls of high-rise buildings has always been the operation mode of "one bucket of water, one rope and one board". Wall washers swing around tall buildings with ropes around their waists, which is not only inefficient, but also prone to accidents. In recent years, with the development of science and technology, this situation has improved. At present, there are two main methods used at home and abroad: one is to manually clean glass windows and walls by using lifting platforms or hanging baskets; The other is to aim the window cleaner at the window and use the track and cable suspension system installed on the roof to scrub it automatically. The second method requires that the window cleaning system should be considered at the beginning of architectural design, which can not adapt to the stepped wall, which limits the use of this method.
After the reform and opening up, China's economic construction has developed rapidly, and high-rise buildings have mushroomed everywhere. However, due to the nonstandard architectural design, the cleaning of most high-rise buildings in China is done by hanging blue manually. Based on this situation, Beihang Robotics Research Institute cooperated with Beijing Railway Bureau Research Institute of Ministry of Railways to develop a glass ceiling (about 3,000 square meters) cleaning robot for Beijing West Railway Station.
The robot consists of a robot body and a ground-supported robot car. The robot body is the main body that crawls along the glass wall and completes the scrubbing action, weighing 25 kilograms. It can walk and scrub flexibly according to the actual environment with high reliability. The ground supporting trolley belongs to supporting equipment. When the robot works, it is responsible for power supply, gas supply, water supply and sewage recovery for the robot. It is connected to the robot through pipes.
At present, Harbin Institute of Technology and Shanghai University are engaged in the research of building cleaning robots in China, both of which have their own products.
Building cleaning robot is developed on the basis of wall-climbing robot, which is only one of the uses of wall-climbing robot. The wall-climbing robot has two adsorption modes: negative pressure adsorption and magnetic adsorption, and the building window cleaning robot adopts negative pressure adsorption. Magnetic adsorption wall-climbing robot has also come out in China and been applied in Daqing Oilfield. The so-called heartlessness of fire and water shows the threat of fire and water to human beings and people's helplessness to fire and water. When it comes to fire, people will think of a tragedy. According to statistics of relevant departments, there were 38,000 fires in China in 1995, with 2,233 deaths and 3,770 injuries, resulting in direct economic losses of1.800 million yuan. 1997 There were more than 40,000 fires140,000, with 2,722 deaths and 4,930 injuries, resulting in property losses 154 billion yuan. What a shocking number!
Facing the ruthless fire, Shanghai Fire Research Institute of the Ministry of Public Security, Shanghai Jiaotong University and Shanghai Fire Bureau have made plans to develop fire-fighting robots. After three years of research, the first fire-fighting robot in China was born. Fire fighting robots can walk, climb mountains, cross obstacles, breathe fire and conduct fire detection.
In recent years, China's petrochemical and other basic industries have developed rapidly, and flammable, explosive and highly toxic chemicals have increased sharply in the production process. Due to equipment and management reasons, leakage, burning and explosion accidents of dangerous chemicals and radioactive substances have increased. As a kind of special fire fighting equipment, fire fighting robot can replace firemen to approach the fire scene, and carry out effective fire fighting and rescue, chemical inspection and fire scene reconnaissance. Its application will improve the actual combat capability of the fire brigade in fighting extraordinarily serious fires, and will play an important role in reducing national property losses and casualties of fire fighting and rescue personnel. Following the fire and explosion of Qingshuihe River in Shenzhen, the fire of Jinling Petrochemical in Nanjing and the fire in the tank farm of Beijing Oriental Chemical Plant, the voice of domestic fire forces demanding the development and equipment of fire fighting robots is getting higher and higher. The successful development of the fire-fighting robot will have an important impact on the development of fire-fighting equipment and the technical and tactical expansion of fire-fighting forces in China in the 2 1 century.
Not only in China, but also in the world, fire fighting is a big problem, and governments all over the world are trying their best to minimize fire losses.
1984165438+1October, a fire broke out in a cable tunnel in Tokyo, Japan, and firefighters had to put out the fire in the tunnel under the dangerous environment of thick smoke and high temperature. After the fire broke out, the Tokyo Fire Department began to study fire-fighting robots that can work under harsh conditions. At present, five kinds of fire fighting robots have been put into use.
Remote control fire fighting robot
This robot was first used in 1986. This kind of robot can be used when it is difficult for firefighters to get close to the fire or there is a danger of explosion. This robot is equipped with crawler, and its maximum running speed can reach 10 km/h, and it can spray 5 tons of water or 3 tons of foam per minute.
Jet fire fighting robot
This robot was successfully developed by 1989, which belongs to a kind of remote-controlled fire-fighting robot and is used to put out fires in narrow passages and underground areas. This robot is 45cm high, 74cm wide and120cm long. It is driven by a jet engine or a common engine. When the robot arrives at the fire, in order to put out the flame, the nozzle turns the water flow into high-pressure water mist and sprays it to the flame.
Fire reconnaissance robot
The fire-fighting reconnaissance robot was born in 199 1. It is used to collect all kinds of information around the fire scene and support firefighters in the case of thick smoke or toxic gas. The robot has four tracks, one manipulator and nine kinds of data acquisition equipment, including camera, thermal distribution indicator and gas concentration measuring instrument.
Climbing rescue robot
1993 The climbing rescue robot was used for the first time. When a fire suddenly breaks out on the upper floor of a high-rise building, the robot can climb the outer wall of the building to investigate the fire and carry out rescue and fire fighting work. The robot can use a winch to lift itself along the wire rope descending from the top of the building, and then use the negative pressure sucker to move freely on the building. This robot can climb a 70-meter-high building.
Rescue robot
The rescue robot was first put into use in 1994. This robot can move the injured person to a safe place. The robot is 4m long,1.74m wide,1.89m high and weighs 3860kg.. It is equipped with rubber tracks with a maximum speed of 4 km/h. It not only has information collection devices, such as TV cameras, combustible gas detectors, ultrasonic detectors, etc. There are also two manipulators with a maximum grip of 90kg. The manipulator can lift the injured to the rescue platform, where it can provide them with fresh air.
In June 2000, a fire broke out in the cable car tunnel of the Austrian Snow Mountain, killing more than 60 people. Because of the darkness, cold and thick smoke in the tunnel, it is very difficult to put out the fire and clean up the site. This once again shows the importance of special fire fighting equipment.