A Robot With Beanbag Hands Learns the Gentle Touch

The simple act of picking something up requires a plethora of decisions: Is the thing light or heavy? How much force do I need to grip it? If I grip too hard, will I crush it with the might of my mighty hands? As we grow up we become fairly practiced at the art of picking up (objects, that is), so our brains will do most of this for us without a lot of conscious thought. But all those variables—plus adapting to a surprise on the fly—mean that picking things up with the proper force is one of the most difficult skills to teach a robot. That's why the design by Eric Brown's team is so clever. In this week's Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Brown and colleagues demonstrate (paper in press) their "universal gripper," a successful prototype of a robot hand. It's based on an idea that's been around for a while, and it looks like a beanbag on a robot arm, because, well, that's kind of what it is.