A team of students at Columbia University, led by Jason Ravel, has taken inspiration from a number of sources, including the Turtlebot by Willow Garage, Boxie the Robot from MIT, and Rosie the Robot from The Jetsons, to design a human-sized general purpose robot called Talos. Built for just US$800, this low cost robot has arms, a face, and can answer voice commands.
This first version of Talos was designed to carry out several simple functions. The original concept was to use the robot for telepresence operations, like guarding the lab at night. The robot can retrieve an object and bring it to a person; it can respond to several simple voice commands, like “follow me” or “shake hands”; it can be controlled by a remote application on a tablet computer; and it can dance, as an entertainment function.
The robot project as an open source hardware platform that other robotics students could expand and modify as the software is built on an open architecture that allows for expansion and the addition of new abilities. The team sees Talos as a model for a lower-cost humanoid robot that can function in a home or office environment.
Next steps in the project will be improving the object recognition and retrieval capability. The team will also be working on new navigation functions that use landmarks and can make maps as the robot roams around.
SharathAnnaiah 