We’ve become accustomed to our smartwatches and smartphones sensing what our bodies are doing, be it walking, driving or sleeping. But what about our hands? It turns out that smartwatches, with a few tweaks, can detect a surprising number of things your hands are doing. Researchers at Carnegie Mellon University’s Human-Computer Interaction Institute (HCII) have […]
Sound, Vibration Recognition Boost Context-Aware Computing
Smart devices can seem dumb if they don’t understand where they are or what people around them are doing. Carnegie Mellon University researchers say this environmental awareness can be enhanced by complementary methods for analyzing sound and vibrations. “A smart speaker sitting on a kitchen countertop cannot figure out if it is in a kitchen, […]
Specially Prepared Paper Can Bend, Fold Or Flatten On Command
Pipe-Crawling Robot Will Help Decommission DOE Nuclear Facility
A pair of autonomous robots developed by Carnegie Mellon University’s Robotics Institute will soon be driving through miles of pipes at the U.S. Department of Energy’s former uranium enrichment plant in Piketon, Ohio, to identify uranium deposits on pipe walls. The CMU robot has demonstrated it can measure radiation levels more accurately from inside the […]
AI, Crowdsourcing Combine To Close ‘Analogy Gap’
Researchers at Carnegie Mellon University and the Hebrew University of Jerusalem devised a method enabling computers to mine databases of patents, inventions and research papers, identifying ideas that can be repurposed to solve new problems or create new products. Specifically, they developed a way for computers to find analogies—comparisons between sometimes disparate methods and problems […]
CMU Researchers Create Touchpads With A Can Of Spray Paint
Touch sensing is most common on small, flat surfaces such as smartphone or tablet screens. Researchers at Carnegie Mellon University, however, can turn surfaces of a wide variety of shapes and sizes into touchpads using tools as simple as a can of spray paint. Walls, furniture, steering wheels, toys and even Jell-O can be turned […]
Model Driverless Car Regulations After Drug Approval Process, AI Ethics Experts Argue
Autonomous systems — like driverless cars — perform tasks that previously could only be performed by humans. In a new IEEE Intelligent Systems Expert Opinion piece, Carnegie Mellon University artificial intelligence ethics experts David Danks and Alex John London argue that current safety regulations do not plan for these systems and are therefore ill-equipped to ensure that […]
Researchers Map How The Brain Processes Faces From Sight To Recognition
At a glance, you can recognize a friend’s face whether they are happy or sad or even if you haven’t seen them in a decade. How does the brain do this — recognize familiar faces with efficiency and ease despite extensive variation in how they appear? Researchers at Carnegie Mellon University are closer than ever […]
Repurposed Sensor Enables Smartwatch To Detect Finger Taps And Other Bio-Acoustic Signals
A smartwatch is capable of detecting and distinguishing a variety of taps, flicks and scratches by the hands and fingers, and all that’s required is a software upgrade that repurposes the device’s existing accelerometer, Carnegie Mellon University researchers discovered. This new functionality makes possible new applications that use common gestures to control the smartwatch and, […]
Omnidirectional Mobile Robot Has Just Two Moving Parts
More than a decade ago, Ralph Hollis invented the ballbot, an elegantly simple robot whose tall, thin body glides atop a sphere slightly smaller than a bowling ball. The latest version, called SIMbot, has an equally elegant motor with just one moving part: the ball. The only other active moving part of the robot is […]