The 2009 International Robot Exhibition took place in Tokyo at the end of last month, and if there’s anything that stands out from the photos, it’s the incredible diversity across all aspects of the robots -including shape, size, material and function.
Motoman, an industrial robot that can work on an assembly line and swordfight. Meet more of the exhibition participants after the jump.
The new X-Flex Blast Protection wallpaper, created Berry Plastics and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, promises to help walls keep their shape and guard against flying debris in the face of explosions. Watch as a heavy wrecking ball fails to tear down a brick wall lined with a single sheet of this amazing stuff. [PopSci]
Core77, one of our favorite design blogs, recently featured some pretty impressive stair-climbing robots (the one above is from the Intelligent Robot Lab at the University of Tsukuba). For many more creative solutions to stairs, see this blog post.
Festo’s new robotic penguins can fly, swim and communicate with each other via sonar. Anyone else worried about impending penguin world domination? [Time]
One of the exciting things about engineers is their ability to inject new life and variation into seemingly mundane and ordinary objects. Case in point: the chair. Recently the design blog Core 77 has featured a few truly nifty chairs that demonstrate just how clever engineers can be when faced with real-world issues.
The Setu Chair, created by German design team Studio 7.5, tackles the complications that arise with adjustable office chairs. Since many people share the same workspace these days, having a chair that must be constantly readjusted can be awkward. So the engineers and designers at Studio 7.5 came up with the Setu, a chair with a flexible “spine” that shifts to accommodate the weight and body contours of different users. The team made over 35 functional models in their Berlin workshop before presenting the final product.
