美国加州Unbounded Robotics公司在本周举行的“机器人商情会议与展览 (RoboBusiness 2013)”上发表一款3,5000美元的 UBR-1 (读做 uber-one)低价机器人。Unbounded Robotics在今年初才从专业机器人研发公司Willow Garage (曾打造出PR-2)拆分独立而出，该公司的目标就在打造一款性能更强大但价格更低10倍的移动机器人。
“我 们的员工主要来自Willow Garage公司开发团队的主要成员，负责一些3-5年的开发项目，但我们还想进行一些更快完成的计划，因此在年初成立独立的公司，”Unbounded Robotics公司首席执行官Melonee Wise指出，“在Unbounded公司时，我们从头开始做起，不仅回归我们认为人们所需要的机器人概念，同时也得以降低行动机器人平台的成本。”
Unbounded Robotics的首款机器人行动平台主要针对研究人员与企业需求而打设计：能简化编程的单手机器人。
Source：Unbounded Robotics, Eric GulbransenIbOesmc
这 家公司总共只有4名员工，除了Melonee Wise以外，还包括一名电子工程师(系统工程师Derek King)、一名机械工程师(机械工程师Eric Diehr)、一名软件工程师(首席技术官Michael Ferguson)，他们在不到一年的时间内就开发出这款 UBR-1 机器人了。该开发团队最重要的原则在于确保人类安全，因此，UBR-1 就是一款专为能与人们共同工作的协同机器人，就算当有人挡到路时， UBR-1 机器人也不至于伤害人类。
本文授权编译自EE Times，版权所有，谢绝转载
第2页：这种协同机器人能与你一起工作
第3页：采用Ubuntu Linux LTS操作系统，英特尔第四代i5处理器
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Melonee Wise解释：“这种协同机器人能与你一起工作。我们设计出一只手臂的机器人，让任何成年人在有必要的情况下也能轻易制服他，而且，我们还为这些机器安装 传感器，让他们能感知周遭环境，主动计划行走路线，以避开附近的人与障碍物。机器人的基座内建雷射扫描机、头部还安装了视觉传感器，使其建构出可以看到你 的一种外在世界模式，因而能够在你附近行走自如。机器人手臂的动作也是一样的──它并不会盲目规划路线，而是设法避免撞到物体。”
UBR – 1机器人可顺利处理专为人类设计的一般物体。
Source：Unbounded Robotics, Eric GulbransenIbOesmc
安装在机器人基座的Hokuyo扫描仪会持续计算器器人距离面前的物体还有多远，而头部采用PrimeSense的 3D视觉传感器，从而实现实时软件，以建构出 UBR-1 周遭的世界地图。为了进行与完成用户的命令， UBR-1 持续更新其实时地图，使其即使在行进间也能经由导航路径顺利地绕过障碍物。
UBR-1 机器人的单一手臂拥有七个自由度──由7个马达驱动手臂中的7个关节，每个关节中都内建编码器告诉机器人目前所处的位置。此外，在机器人的手爪中它还结合了6自由度的惯性感测单元(IMU──3轴加速度计与3轴陀螺仪)，使其得以感测精细的动作以及侦测是否接触掌握到物体。此外，手臂的两个关节──手腕与手肘部份──还能连续旋转，“真的有助于让机器人实现一些难以达到的位置，”Melonee Wise说。
Melonee Wise将机器人手臂上像箝子般的手称为“80%的手爪” ，因为它的平行面“可抓取约80%你想要它拿的东西。”而其它20%的任务，则必须由其它专用的钳子来取代──从吸盘到静电钳子等。这只机器人的手臂长可 及地，而利用 UBR-1 可伸缩的手臂还可碰触到货架高处的对象。
本文授权编译自EE Times，版权所有，谢绝转载
第3页：采用Ubuntu Linux LTS操作系统，英特尔第四代i5处理器
相关阅读：
• 智能机器来袭，你的饭碗还保得住吗？
• 智能手机业减速，日本机器人厂商寄希望于汽车业
• 教你DIY最狂拽炫酷的万圣节电子搞怪IbOesmc
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UBR-1采用Ubuntu Linux LTS 操作系统，执行于英特尔第四代 i5 处理器上，基于ARM的ST微控制器负责管理马达与移动组件。基座部份也安装了6自由度的 MEMS IMU 。
该 机器人平台执行于开放来源的机器人操作系统( ROS)，拥有各种可用的应用程序，如可进行实时规划的 MoveIt ，以及一套由Unbounded Robotics提供的客制应用程序，可实现导航、校正以及操纵杆遥控。机器人还可经由拖曳手臂动作的方式进行编程，使其记录一些常用动作以便重复利用。
UBR-1利用简化的图形编程语言来定义其行动。。
Source：Unbounded Robotics, Eric GulbransenIbOesmc
UBR-1是专为机器人研究人员以及商业而设计，如用于库存控制中，它可浏览仓储后拾取所需货品，然后置于进店货架中。工业应用包括机器管理，例如从 CNC 机器上移除完成的组件，然后递补下一款组件。
Unbounded Robotics还看好 UBR-1 的其它可能应用，例如在饭店中提供客房服务、协助家中老人的居家照护，如提醒服药、送水或拾起掉在地板上的遥控器，甚至还可陪老人打牌。
本文授权编译自EE Times，版权所有，谢绝转载
编译：Susan Hong
参考英文原文：Unbounded Robotics Unveils Co-Robot，by R. Colin Johnson
相关阅读：
• 智能机器来袭，你的饭碗还保得住吗？
• 智能手机业减速，日本机器人厂商寄希望于汽车业
• 教你DIY最狂拽炫酷的万圣节电子搞怪IbOesmc
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Unbounded Robotics Unveils Co-Robot
R. Colin Johnson
PORTLAND, Ore. — The day fast approaches when that colleague you have lunch with in the office breakroom will not be a person at all. Earlier this year Unbounded Robotics Inc. in Santa Clara, Calif., spun off from Willow Garage -- maker of the pioneering Personal Robot (now in its second generation, PR-2). The goal was to create an even more powerful mobile robot that was 10-times less expensive. The result was the $35,000 UBR-1 (pronounced "uber-one"), which the company unveils this week at RoboBusiness 2013 (Oct. 23-25, Santa Clara).
"Our staff were key members of the Willow Garage development team, working on projects three-to-five years out, but we wanted to do something sooner, so we spun off," said Unbounded Robotics CEO Melonee Wise in an interview with EE Times. "At Unbounded we started with a clean slate -- went back to what we thought people needed, while bringing down the cost of mobile robotics platforms."
Unbounded Robotics' first model is a mobile platform for researchers and businesses wishing for an easy-to-program, one-armed assistant.
(Source: Unbounded Robotics, Eric Gulbransen)
The four-person company includes an electrical engineer (Lead Systems Engineer Derek King), a mechanical engineer (Lead Mechanical Engineer Eric Diehr), and a software engineer (Chief Technology Officer Michael Ferguson), who together with Wise designed the UBR-1 in under a year. Their primary directive was human safety, since as a co-robot the UBR-1 is designed to work alongside people without harming them even if they get in the way. Wise told us:
A co-robot is something that can work alongside you. We designed the arm so that any adult can overpower it, if they need to, plus we have sensors on the robot that allow the robot to sense its environment and actively plan routes around people and other obstacles. The laser scanner in the base and the visual sensor in its head create a model of the world that sees you, so it can drive around you. It's the same with the arm motion -- it does not plan blindly, but avoids bumping into things.
UBR-1's manipulator can handle ordinary objects designed for humans.
(Source: Unbounded Robotics, Eric Gulbransen)
The Hokuyo laser scanner in the base is constantly calculating the distance to objects in front of the robot, while the head has a 3D visual sensor from PrimeSense Ltd. in Tel-Aviv, which enables real-time software to create a map of the world around the UBR-1. When fulfilling the commands of its user, the UBR-1 constantly updates its real-time map so that its navigation routines allow it to smoothly glide around obstacles even if they are moving.
The UBR-1 has a single arm with seven degrees of freedom -- seven motors driving seven joints in the arm, each of which has encoders to tell the robot what position it is in. That, combined with a six-degrees-of-freedom inertial measurement unit (a three-axis accelerometer and three-axis gyroscope) in the gripper, allows it to sense fine movements as well as to detect when it comes into contact with objects. In addition, two of the joints in the arm -- the wrist and the elbow -- can rotate continuously, which "really helps the robot get into hard-to-reach locations," according to Wise.
The gripper on the arm is called an "80-percent gripper" by Wise, because its parallel faces "can do 80 percent of the things you want a gripper to do." For the other 20 percent, it is replaceable with any number of specialized grippers -- from a suction cup to an electrostatic gripper. The arm also has the ability to reach all the way to the ground as well as to reach high up on shelves by virtue of the telescoping torso of the UBR-1.
UBR-1 uses a simple graphic programming language to define its actions.
(Source: Unbounded Robotics, Eric Gulbransen)
Internally, the Ubuntu Linux LTS operating system is running on an Intel fourth-generation i5 processor, which communicates with an even dozen STMicroelectronic ARM-based microcontrollers, which manage the motors and moving parts. The base also has its own six-degrees-of-freedom MEMS inertial measurement unit.
The robot runs the open-source robot operating system (ROS) and all the applications available for it, such as MoveIt, for real-time planning, as well as a suite of custom applications supplied by Unbounded Robotics for navigation, calibration, and joystick tele-operation. The robot can also be programmed by dragging the arm around, with it recording those movements that can then be repeated.
The UBR-1 is designed for both robotics researchers as well as for businesses such as inventory control, where it can browse through warehouses picking up items that it then takes into the store for stocking shelves. Industrial applications include machine tending, such as removing finished parts from computerized numerical control (CNC) machines then inserting fresh stock for the next part.
Unbounded Robotics also envisions many other applications of its robots -- from delivering room service orders in hotels, to helping the elderly to age-in-place at home by retrieving such things as pill bottles or a glass of water or picking up the remote control dropped on the floor. Maybe the deluxe model will play cards, too.
责编：Quentin
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