Coral-repairing robots take a step closer to reality

Since humans are responsible for much of the damage to coral reefs, it makes sense that we should try and help repair them. That’s exactly what a team from the Herriot-Watt University’s Centre for Marine Biodiversity and Biotechnology is attempting to do with the development of underwater “coralbots.” Now anyone can add their support to this worthy effort with the launch of a Kickstarter campaign that will help make the robots a reality.

The research team has already built a couple of prototype coralbots that can be equipped with onboard camera, computer, and flexible arms and grippers. These would come together to allow the robot to reattach healthy pieces of coral back onto a reef to help speed up the healing process. This time-consuming task is currently performed by scuba divers – or not at all. It also makes repairing reefs at greater depths difficult or impossible.

Coral reef repair is time-consuming for scuba divers

The team’s plan is to develop a swarm of robots that would autonomously navigate across a damaged coral reef and transplant pieces of healthy coral as they went. The Heriot-Watt researchers says they have already tested their coralbot prototypes at sea but need help both with developing the computer vision system that would allow the robots to visually identify healthy bits of coral and with configuring a manipulator arm with which the robots could pick up and place the coral pieces in the right spot.

The team is hoping to raise US$107,000 to allow them to put all the pieces together and build two robots to publicly demonstrate the feasibility of the technology on a coral reef in a public aquarium. They hope that this will help attract further funds to ultimately realize their goal of producing a team of eight coralbots that could be used on coral reefs around the globe.

Given the nature of the project, backer rewards are limited to recognition of involvement in the form of names printed on the project’s website or the robots themselves. But the real reward is the warm fuzzy feeling you’ll get from knowing you’re helping preserve one of the planet’s most important ecosystems.

Comments

Google to build green-roof California HQ

An image has been released of what looks set to become Google's new California HQ. Named Bay View, the nine-building campus is designed to maximize the likelihood of innovation-friendly chance encounters between the workforce. "You can't schedule innovation," Google's David Radcliffe tells Vanity Fair . "We want to create opportunities for people to have ideas and be able to turn to others right there and say, 'What do you think of this?'" This philosophy has fostered the design's angular office blocks, arranged back to back like nodding clergy. Despite the 1.1 million sq ft (102,000 sq m), employees will be a maximum of a 2.5-minute walk away from one another, Vanity Fair reports. Perhaps most remarkable is that this is Google's first build. In its 15-year history, Google has only ever occupied buildings previously used by others. "We've been the world's best hermit crabs: we've found other people's shell...

Nerf Vulcan Sentry Gun tracks targets and avoids friendly fire

Anyone who plays video games will know that few things protect an area like a well-placed sentry gun. In the real world, though, even a person's bedroom or office could use a little protection sometimes, which is why one designer has built the Nerf Vulcan Sentry Gun. Using a custom program and some servos, the sentry can automatically locate targets and unleash a stream of foam darts at over seven times the usual speed, while keeping its owner out of the crosshairs. Britt Liv Ulrike Michelsen, a chemical and biological engineering student from Germany, designed and constructed the sentry using mostly basic electronics and some plywood. This isn't the first time she's modified a Nerf gun, but building this robotic turret is arguably her most ambitious project to date. Luckily, the Nerf Vulcan already operates using an electric motor, so controlling the actual firing mechanism through a computer was just a matter of connecting it directly to an Arduino Uno and a laptop. ...

Wired wood: Gizmag's top ten wooden gadgets

We may be surrounded by gadgetry clad in shiny aluminum and gaudy plastic, but there's still a place left in the digital age for the comfort, simplicity and beauty of wood. Perhaps its the trend towards a "green" aesthetic or some deeper drive to get back to nature, but we've noticed a growing number of consumer electronics offerings in recent times that mesh circuit boards and synthetics with the wonders of wood. With this in mind, we've scoured our resources to come up with this list of Gizmag's top ten wooden gadgets. OOOMS Wooden USB Stick OOOMS, a design company based in The Netherlands, has created a USB stick that is made of … a stick. The creators literally pick up sticks, based on quality and appearance, and professionally work them into unique USB sticks that can hold from 2 to 16 Gb. Wooden Records Amanda Ghassaei has developed a laser cutting system that can carve music into a wooden record . After pulling audio from a WAV file with P...

ANBARASUASOKAN

Search This Blog