By Spencer Ackerman
Wired
BOSTON — Robots aren’t often athletic. But in this new video, a prototype version of a robot sponsored by the Pentagon’s blue-sky researchers climbs over wooden blocks, jumps while maintaining its balance, and climbs up stairs — the kinds of athletic tasks that Darpa wants robots to perform in order to aid with disaster relief.
This is the Pet-Proto, a cousin of the PETMAN humanoid robot manufactured by Boston Dynamics, makers of the headless BigDog robo-mule. Darpa released video of its athletic prowess on Wednesday as part of the next phase of its latest grand challenge, an effort to vastly expand the capabilities of robots so they can help repair meltdowns at nuclear plants, rescue people trapped in collapsed buildings, and assist with other disaster-mitigation efforts.
The skills that the Pet-Proto performs in the video are somewhat indicative of what Darpa wants out of its Robotics Challenge, announced in the spring. Contestants will have to go beyond the state of the art: Darpa will make the competing robot designs drive cars; walk over an uneven, debris-strewn surface; climb shaky industrial ladders and catwalks; use power tools to break through a concrete panel; find and close a valve near a leaky pipe; and replace a piece of industrial machinery like a cooling pump. There’s a reason Darpa calls these things challenges. At the end of a 27-month gauntlet of tests, the winning team will get a $2 million prize.
Full story: Watch Darpa’s Rescue Robot Jump, Climb and Dodge Obstacles