Contents
30 October 2019
Vol 4, Issue 35
Vol 4, Issue 35
Focus
- Your mileage may vary
Requiring and rethinking reproducibility will foster faster progress in robotics.
Research Articles
- Magnetic quadrupole assemblies with arbitrary shapes and magnetizations
Magnetic quadrupole modules form stable assemblies with arbitrary two-dimensional shapes and magnetizations.
- Dynamic locomotion synchronization of bipedal robot and human operator via bilateral feedback teleoperation
A bilateral teleoperation system facilitates locomotion synchronization of a human operator and a small bipedal robot.
- Teaching robots social autonomy from in situ human guidance
A robot was programmed to progressively learn appropriate social autonomous behavior from in situ human demonstrations and guidance.
- Minimal navigation solution for a swarm of tiny flying robots to explore an unknown environment
A minimal navigation solution is presented for swarms of tiny flying robots to explore unknown, GPS-denied environments.
About The Cover
ONLINE COVER Providing a SPARC. Children respond well to social robots, interacting with them more than with software on a tablet or computer. Senft et al. used a machine learning technique called SPARC (supervised progressively autonomous robot competencies) to enable social robots to learn from a (human) teacher how to coach children playing an educational game. Initially, the robots did not act unless remotely controlled by the teacher; as the teacher selected actions, SPARC learned which behaviors were appropriate for particular situations. The technique may allow domain experts to quickly train social robots to autonomously choose safe actions without requiring specialized programming skills. [CREDIT: PIKUL NOOROD/SHUTTERSTOCK.COM]
