High-speed robotic arm

A group of researchers from the Swiss State Institute of Technology (Ecole polytechnique fédérale de Lausanne, EPFL) has created a high-speed robotic manipulator capable of catching objects that they throw at him.

The system evaluates the shape of the object, the trajectory of its flight and its position in space at the interception point.


The highlight of the project is the learning ability of the system - first the person, moving the manipulator in the direction of the flying object, shows the program a very rough, approximate scheme of actions. After that, an independent refinement of the algorithm is performed. You can watch the result on video.
')
At the moment, this system has two major drawbacks:
1) tracking of objects does not occur directly from the manipulator, but with the help of several cameras located in different parts of the room.
2) items must be equipped with infrared markers so that cameras recognize them.