‘Bionic’ robot functions, walks with artificial parts
NEW YORK — Gentlemen, we can rebuild him. After all, we have the technology.
The term “bionic man” was the stuff of science fiction in the 1970s, when a popular TV show called “The Six Million Dollar Man” chronicled the adventures of Steve Austin, a former astronaut whose body was rebuilt using artificial parts after he nearly died.
Now, a team of engineers have assembled a robot using artificial organs, limbs and other body parts that comes tantalizingly close to a true “bionic man.” For real, this time.
The artificial “man” is the subject of a Smithsonian Channel documentary that airs Oct. 20 at 9 p.m. ET. Called “The Incredible Bionic Man,” it chronicles an attempt by engineers to assemble a functioning body using artificial parts that range from a working kidney and circulation system to cochlear and retina implants.
The parts hail from 17 manufacturers around the world. This is the first time they’ve been assembled together, said Richard Walker, managing director of Shadow Robot Co. and the lead roboticist on the project.
“(It’s) an attempt to showcase just how far medical science has gotten,” he said.
The robot appeared in the U.S. for the first time. Having crossed the Atlantic tucked inside two metal trunks — and after a brief holdup in customs — the bionic man strutted his stuff at the New York Comic Con convention.
Walker said the robot has 60 to 70 percent of the function of a human. It stands 61⁄ feet tall and can step, sit and stand with the help of a walking machine that’s used by people who’ve lost the ability to walk because of a spinal injury. It also has a functioning heart that, using an electronic pump, beats and circulates artificial blood, which carries oxygen just like human blood. An artificial, implantable kidney, meanwhile, replaces the function of a modern-day dialysis unit.
Although the parts used in the robot work, many of them are a long way from being used in humans. The kidney, for example, is only a prototype. And there are some key parts missing: There’s no digestive system, liver or skin. And, of course, no brain.
The bionic man was modeled after Bertolt Meyer, a 36-year-old social psychologist at the University of Zurich who was born without his lower left arm and wears a bionic prosthesis. The robot’s face was created based on a 3-D scan of Meyer’s face.
“We wanted to showcase that the technology can provide aesthetic prostheses for people who have lost parts of their faces, for example, their nose,” because of an accident or disease such as cancer, Meyer said.
Meyer said he initially felt a sense of unease when he first saw the robot.
“It was quite a shock to see a face that closely resembles what I see in the mirror every morning on this kind of dystopian looking machine,” he said.
And the cost? While the parts used in the experiment were donated, their value is about $1 million.