April 19, 2011

Check out this the HECTOR spider robot

This spidery looking robot is designed by the University of Bielefeld’s Department of Biological Cybernetics, and it is the HECTOR, which is a weird quasi-acronym meaning the HExapod Cognitive auTonmously Operating Robot.

This mechanical arachnid is about a meter long, and weighs in at 12 kilograms, with 13 percent of it being the exoskeleton. I’m not certain what percentage of a real spider’s weight is its exoskeleton, but it does have joints on its legs that allow for 20 degrees, just like a real spider.

This is one of those robots that I would like to see made, if it didn’t creep me out so much. I think that there is something about spiders that tend to freak people out. Perhaps that is why there were these mechanical spiders hunting Tom Selleck in the movie Runaway. Man, going back in time for that reference!

Here’s a more recent reference, as HECTOR looks a little like the IC Hexapod that we reported on three years ago, which bore a strong resemblance to the probe droid from The Empire Strikes Back.

I wonder what is the use of this mechanical arachnid. Perhaps it could be used to take pictures.

8 comments:

  1. Taking it a bit too far in the AI level, they want it to solve problems on its own, that's just a few steps away from making more of itself. Scary stuff.

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  2. cool looking robot...one day they'll be hunting us down (;

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  3. gah! I still hate spiders! Especially robot spiders you cant squish!

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  4. love the tom selleck reference lol. i want one of those spiders!

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  5. Please change this into something other than a spider. If we're going to be overrun by an army of ai robots I'll be happy as long as they aren't robots.

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