Origami next frontier in
robotics
PITTSBURGH,
Pennsylvania (AP) -- Robots can scamper across the surface of Mars, defuse
bombs and vacuum floors. Now they also can fold small pieces of paper.
Officials at
Carnegie Mellon University are excited about a
graduate student who has developed a robot capable of doing origami -- the
traditional Japanese art of folding paper to make figures or sculptures.
"Origami
is way out there -- it's like a space shot," said Matthew Mason, a
professor of computer science and robotics.
Doctoral
candidate Devin Balkcom has created a robot that
can make paper airplanes and hats.
Origami has
important research applications because although robots have been taught to
manipulate rigid objects such as golf clubs, they struggle when the objects
are flexible, like paper or the human tissues that surgical robots must
navigate.
Balkcom's robot uses a suction cup to pick and move
paper, which is manipulated over a gutter on a metal surface.
The paper is
then pushed down into the gutter using a straight-edge ruler attached to
the robotic arm, and the gutter closes on the paper to crease it.
Balkcom is scheduled to earn his Ph.D
with the project in August.
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