Atlas: a robot-humanoid created by the Pentagon and Boston Dynamics for rescue work

Pentagon agency DARPA has introduced Atlas, an advanced robotic prototype with human design for use in rescue work in natural disasters, developed by Boston Dynamics.

DARPA (Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency), the Pentagon agency, and the robotic specialist Boston Dynamics have designed an advanced robotic prototype in human form, called Atlas, for use in rescue work in natural disasters and emergency situations.

This prototype, which will be presented at homestead Miami Speedway in December 2013, the first physics competition in advanced robot design DARPA Robotics Challenge, to help the population in the face of natural disasters, will also be integrated in the future for use in extreme and complex applications in the U.S. military., as reported by the Extreme Tech portal.

Atlas, with a height of 1,88 M. And 150 Kg. weighty, offers a humanoid appearance, similar to the one that has been used in futuristic films such as 'Terminator', with a very complex and sophisticated technology, never used until now for this type of prototypes.

The structure of this robot consists of twenty-eight joints driven with a hydraulic system, that are managed from a robust and powerful computer integrated inside that works in real time, to which a stereo audio equipment has also been added.

The Atlas Robot's Lower Motion Capacity Tests, even for walking on uneven terrain, as well as the superior ones to take objects have been a success for their flexibility and precision.

At the moment, this prototype has stereoscopic vision and a lidar laser light radar system, a laser rangefinder to calculate distances and a camera system similar to that used in autonomous vehicles. One of the challenges for its set-up is the design of the head and its autonomy, since until now its operation is attached to a power supply.

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