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Called "Xavier," the robots are equipped with seven cameras that enable them to detect "undesirable social behaviour," for instance if you incorrectly park your bike, if you smoke in an unauthorised area or if social distancing is not being respected. "If the robot is around and something happens, the people in the control room will have a trace and will be able to see what happened", he said. This type of activity can have huge social impacts: paranoia with anything and everything you do. Who decides 'undesirable social behavior'? How about when only part of the scenario is captured by the robot, who is believed? You or the robot? What's next - a taser-armed robot, with someone in a room with a joystick ready to deploy? On do we eventually get so many robots that we just let them decide? And how about let's hack in to a few thousand of those armed robots…

A new survey-based study explains how automation is reshaping the workplace in unexpected ways. Robots can improve efficiency and quality, reduce costs, and even help create more jobs for their human counterparts. But more robots can also reduce the need for managers. What if more robots = a better quality of life. We always seem to go negative. What if we could work less, not more?

John Deere has bought Bear Flag Robotics for $250 million in a move that sees it bolster its already strong fleet of autonomous farming robots, a press release reveals. The Silicon Valley-based Bear Flag Robotics was founded in 2017 with the goal of developing autonomous driving technology for tractors and other farm machinery. The deal "will accelerate the delivery of solutions to farmers that address the immense challenge of feeding a growing world," said Jahmy Hindman, Chief Technology Officer at John Deere. A significant amount of work in autonomy is focused on farming, the implementation of these technologies could increase yields as well as the ability to produce crops in areas that have been in the past inhospitable to growing.

Redefining robots. Scientists say they've witnessed a never-before-seen type of replication in organic robots created in the lab using frog cells. Among other things, the findings could have implications for regenerative medicine.

The National Restaurant Association recently reported that 4 in 5 operators are understaffed. This includes 81% of full-service operators and 75% of limited-service operators. Robotics can help ease the staffing challenges and speed up operations.

The weeding machine is a beast at almost 10,000 pounds. It boasts no fewer than eight independently-aimed 150-watt lasers, typically used for metal cutting, that can fire 20 times per second. They're guided by 12 high-resolution cameras connected to AI systems that can recognize good crops from bad weeds. The Laserweeder drives itself with computer vision, finding the furrows in the fields, positioning itself with GPS, and searching for obstacles with LIDAR. It drives 5 miles/hour and can clear 15-20 acres in a day.

They are undifferentiated cells capable of being anything. You might know them as stem cells and now a robot can take them up your nose into your brain. "Researchers have developed a stem cell-based microrobot called "cellbot" capable of delivering stem cells to the brain via intranasal passage using a minimally invasive method. The cellbot has the potential to become a key player in the treatment of neurological disorders such as brain cancer, Parkinson's disease and Alzheimer's disease."

Facebook is working on a new artificial intelligence (AI)-based system that can analyse your lives through first-person videos, recording what they see, do, and hear to assist you with daily tasks. The system is hoping to solve research challenges in 'egocentric perception' (the perception of direction or position of oneself based on visual information). Facebook AI has developed five benchmark challenges centred on first-person visual experience - episodic memory, forecasting, hand and object manipulation, audio-visual "diarization," and social interaction. On the upside, a robotic assistant could be introduced to a person via a series of videos and be able to provide a personalized presence. I would assume that if the robot could have constant access to first-person videos it could continue to learn. On the downside, even more data mining.

Kodiak's fourth-generation truck features a modular and discreet sensor suite in just three locations: a slim profile "center pod" on the front roofline of the truck, and pods integrated into both of the side mirrors. This well-integrated and low profile sensor placement vastly simplifies sensor installation and maintenance, and increases safety. The new generation of Kodiak self-driving trucks will improve the robustness of the autonomous system. It was designed with greater fleet uptime, manufacturing, and serviceability in mind--all of which are critical to scale quickly, safely and efficiently.

The size of a dust mite, many we don't need be chipped, we will be injected.

I have been hearing about injectable robots the size of a dust mite that repair your cells but I can't remember where. Very interesting!

"Corrosion is a dynamic process, more so than even most corrosion engineers realize. It typically has a number of influencing factors that can vary with time and process variables, and so cause corrosion events or upsets to occur. The reason for the lack of appreciation of this situation is that historically long time intervals associated with inspections and off-line measurements do not afford the opportunity to correlate corrosion excursions with operating and process parameters This paper illustrates the importance of implementing an appropriate and correspondingly dynamic means of corrosion appraisal to help manage industrial processes and related corrosion prevention treatments, and to minimize corrosion upsets and failures, and maximize the availability of the plant assets. Value statements are provided that show the potential savings associated with online, real-time corrosion monitoring."

The Pew Research Center survey finds that publics offer mixed views about the use of robots to automate jobs. Across the 20 publics, a median of 48% say such automation has mostly been a good thing, while 42% say it has been a bad thing.

"This crosses a moral, legal and technical line, taking us to a dark and dangerous world," UNSW Sydney AI professor Toby Walsh told Futurism. "Such weapons will be used by terrorists and rogue states. They will be weapons of terror."

On race day, it is not drivers that will make the difference -- but about 40,000 lines of code programmed by each team. "If people get used to seeing cars like these going 300 kilometers per hour... and they don't crash," said Savaresi, they may eventually think that such cars are safe "at 50 kilometers per hour."

University of Utah mechanical engineering professor Jake J. Abbott is leading a team of researchers that has discovered a method to manipulate orbiting debris with spinning magnets. With this technology, robots could one day gently maneuver the scrap to a decaying orbit or further out into space without actually touching it, or they could repair malfunctioning objects to extend their life. Space debris mitigation is a growing problem without a solution, and the objects are travelling so fast that impact of even a small piece of debris with a valuable asset can render it useless. This technology allows moving the objects 'in six degrees of movement, including rotating them', as well as 'control where the debris goes without physically grabbing it.' The tactical value of space assets continues to grow, and being able to control them without contact could be a valuable capability.

Realistic humanoid facial expression and body movement from Engineered Arts in the UK. Ameca will be at CES 2022.

We all have a futuristic vision of lonely robot trucks running alone through a dark desert night in our heads. But, in reality, the first automated commercial vehicle you see "in the wild," will most likely be a truck or van running in a controlled area - possibly under some sort of remote human control or monitoring. For most of us, this probably will be some sort of airport or hotel shuttle bus, running a dedicated route on a dedicated timetable, performing a monotonous, but demanding, task over and over again.