You will be assimilated

Posted by ljmacphee on February 29, 2008 under artificial intelligence in the news |

And how cool is that? Can you imagine grandma and grandpa putting on their brain controlled robot exoskeletons and sneakers to run down to the grocery store for a few things? And good luck to the purse snatcher who grabs grandma’s purse. The baby boomers may live longer and do a whole lot more with a bit of help.

Using the human mind to control computers could lead to a wide range of applications, such as giving people with limited motion the ability to operate machines. However, translating thoughts into actions is a great challenge for researchers. How can a system determine which thoughts should be acted upon, and which thoughts are merely personal thoughts and therefore should be ignored by the system?
More importantly, asks Dr. Mehrdad Fatourechi, can the system provide the users with the ability to control a computer whenever they want? These are the questions that Fatourechi and other “self-paced” brain computer interface (BCI) researchers are trying to answer.

So far, no self-paced BCI system has performed well enough to be suitable for practical applications. But Fatourechi, along with Professors Dr. Rabab K. Ward and Dr. Gary E. Birch from the University of British Columbia, Canada, have recently made a significant improvement with the development of a self-paced, fully automated brain-computer interface. The group’s results are published in a recent issue of the Journal of Neural Engineering. . . . [ read more Self Paced Brain Computer Interface Gets Closer to Reality ]

This could make a huge change in an aging population. No more will you have to be feeble and helpless in old age.

Capturing the spirit of that inspirational catch phrase, a university team lead by Professor Shigeki Toyama formally announced the development of a robot suit they hope will dramatically ease the burden on agricultural field workers as well as other manual labor intensive jobs.

Developed at the Tokyo University of Agriculture and Technology graduate school, with support from the Japan Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry, and Fisheries, the new robot suit attempts to address the challenges faced by Japan’s aging, and difficult to replace, rural farm population. . . [ read more New Robot Suit to Assist Japanese Farmers]