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Randy
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 Posted: Thu May 12, 2005 3:30 am Post subject: Self-replicating robots |
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Self-replicating robots
Cornell University engineers have built an ingenious system of modular robots that reproduce themselves. The research also raises questions about what it means to "self-replicate." From Cornell News:
| Quote: | Their robots are made up of a series of modular cubes -- called "molecubes" -- each containing identical machinery and the complete computer program for replication. The cubes have electromagnets on their faces that allow them to selectively attach to and detach from one another, and a complete robot consists of several cubes linked together. Each cube is divided in half along a long diagonal, which allows a robot composed of many cubes to bend, reconfigure and manipulate other cubes. For example, a tower of cubes can bend itself over at a right angle to pick up another cube.
To begin replication, the stack of cubes bends over and sets its top cube on the table. Then it bends to one side or another to pick up a new cube and deposit it on top of the first. By repeating the process, one robot made up of a stack of cubes can create another just like itself. Since one robot cannot reach across another robot of the same height, the robot being built assists in completing its own construction...
"Although the machines we have created are still simple compared with biological self-reproduction, they demonstrate that mechanical self-reproduction is possible and not unique to biology," the researchers say. |
Link to news article, Link to research site with movies, images, FAQs, and technical papers |
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Miliardo Peacecraft
I probably was Eric
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| Posted: Thu May 12, 2005 5:03 am Post subject: |
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Nice article Randy, but don't you think it would be more appropriate in General Discussion?
This is a complicated and sophisticated article, so I would recommend for people to read similar articles to atleast grasp a basic idea of the concept, if they are not really knowledgeable in this cross-sector department.
Then again, these 'nano-bots' can only reconstruct themselves from the matter already given, so reproduction is pretty far off as a term at this raw and stale stage of development, unless something innovative is discovered or invented which will allow them to assimilate unused parts of surrounding matter.
I mean, robots can't grow or mature through nutrition like living organisms do. So unlike bacteria, protozoa, metazoa, etc., the "self-replicated" robots all have the same total mass they begin with, whereas living micro-organisms grow and amplify all their individual characteristics, including escalation in mass even after separating.
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Gooooogler
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| Posted: Thu May 12, 2005 5:05 am Post subject: |
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That is really increadible. Well we never know what will be our next great invention ? ..
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Miliardo Peacecraft
I probably was Eric
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| Posted: Thu May 12, 2005 6:46 am Post subject: |
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I take a special interest in this because I'm a biology(heh...it was compulsory...but I loved every second) freak! :buttrock: 
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