Robots exercise to reveal how human body works
A team of Japanese engineers has designed robots that can perform push-ups, do crunches, stretch and even sweat while doing so.
The robots Kengoro and Kenshiro, described in the journal Science Robotics, can perform remarkably human-like movements — and could serve as a model to help scientists design better crash dummies and prosthetic limbs and to better understand the moving human body’s mysterious inner workings.
Researchers have been developing humanoid robots for years, each becoming more advanced than the last — but there are still a number of kinks to work out, the study authors wrote.
“A limitation of conventional humanoids is that they have been designed on the basis of the theories of conventional engineering, mechanics, electronics and informatics,” the study authors pointed out.
That’s in part because conventional robots are often made of rigid, unforgiving parts, whereas human bodies (aside from their skeletons) are made of more pliant materials, such as skin and muscle and cartilage, giving them greater flexibility and adaptability to an unpredictable environment.
Traditional robots, the study authors added, are usually built with a particular application in mind — to help with daily tasks or respond to disasters, for example.
“By contrast, our intent is to design a humanoid based on human systems — including the musculoskeletal structure, sensory nervous system, and methods of information processing in the brain — to support science-oriented goals, such as gaining a deeper understanding of the internal mechanisms of humans,” the scientists wrote.
Such a robot could help researchers better understand how our own bodies really work, by giving them a real-life model to experiment with.
“The features crucial for improving humanoids are hidden behind the structure and motion processes of humans,” they wrote. “Hence, we incorporated elements that facilitate fidelity with the human musculoskeletal system.”
To design Kenshiro and Kengoro, the scientists used human statistical data to give the robots more humanoid proportions, both in their mass distribution and in the size of each body part. They set up the skeletal structure and tendon-driven actuator systems that were meant to echo the connections made by muscles and tendons in the human body. Finally, they tried to design the joints to mimic those in human bodies.
The researchers even designed Kengoro to sweat, developing an artificial perspiration system to release heat from the motors.
The scientists say incorporating these kinds of humanoid characteristics could help reveal the invisible inner workings of human bodies — and find better ways to prevent and treat illness and injury.
“One research group has suggested the possibility that a musculoskeletal humanoid can be used in medicine, such as to grow tissue grafts,” the scientists pointed out. “If a humanoid can replicate human movements, then the resulting muscle contribution analysis or sensory data obtained during motion will benefit athletes or sports trainers.”