Nicole Tran
Imagine... living in a world where robots are a part of everyday life.... This may seem like a long time from now, but that time may appear closer than you think.
Honda has created the first humanoid robot that could walk and ascend/descend the stairs easily, that robot is called ASIMO. The whole purpose of developing ASIMO was to serve and assist people so it could make our daily lives easier. ASIMO stands for “Advanced Step in Innovative MObility” and it is the most advanced humanoid robot in the world (as it had been mentioned in the title). The first ASIMO prototype was introduced to the world on October 31st, 2000.
Honda began their research on Humanoid robots in the year 1986. The earliest models they created were E1, E2, E3, which were focused on developing legs that could stimulate the walk of a human. The next series which were E4, E5, E6, were focused on walk stabilization and stair climbing. Next, the head, body and arms were added to improve the balance, and to improve the functionality. Their first humanoid robot, P1, was 6’2” tall, weighing 396 lbs. The next version, P2, had improved on walking, stair climbing/descending and wireless automatic movements. The P3 model was more compact with a height of 5’2” and weight of 287 lbs.
ASIMO has an appearance that resembles a human child dressed in a astrounaut suit wearing a backpack. It has the height of 119 cm, and weighs 54 kg. ASIMO can run or walk up to the speed of 6 km/h. ASIMO can be controlled from a workstation, and also a remote control.
ASIMO was developed at Honda’s Research and Development Waku Fundamental Technical Research Center in Japan. It is the first humanoid robot to be able to walk forward and backwards, and it is also able to climb and descend the stairs easily. Not only does the ASIMO have the ability to walk like we do, since it has camera for eyes, it can easily map its environment and register stationary objects. In addition to ASIMO's ablity to walk, since it has arms and hands it can do things like turn on light switches, open doors, carry objects, and push carts. It has the ability to recognize approximately 10 different faces. Once they are registered ASIMO can address them by name. ASIMO now also has the ability to ditinguinsh between sounds. It responds to name, faces people when spoken to, and recognizes sudden, unusual sounds and faces in that direction, It can respond to questions, either by a brief nod, a shake of the head or a verbal answer.
Honda will still continue on further developing the ASIMO. In the future, Honda has said that ASIMO may serve as another set of eyes, ears, hands and legs for anybody in need. It is also said that in the future, ASIMO might also perform certain tasks that are too dangerous to humans, such as fighting fires or cleaning up toxic spills.
Though now, you might think ASIMO's not much of a big deal, but as technology improves, so will ASIMO. So when the times comes to make ASIMO public, its techonological advancement will definitely be something some people may look forward to.
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