Soft Robots at King’s CoRe

The Centre for Robotics Research (CoRe) at King’s College London is developing technology for “soft robots”. It’s exactly what it sounds like. Taking inspiration from the natural world, these robots have soft exteriors that make them safer and more adept for collaboration with humans. Al Jazeera visited King’s CoRe to report on the latest developments…

STIFF-FLOP in the News

Taking inspiration from the realm of soft-bodied animals, a European-wide team of engineers, biologists and surgeons coordinated by roboticists at King’s College London have made new ground in the framework of EU project STIFF-FLOP (STIFFness controllable Flexible and Learnable manipulator for surgical OPerations) creating soft and stiffness-controllable robotic devices specifically for minimally-invasive surgery. Here, a…

King’s Robot Receptionist Design Competition

The Department of Informatics, King’s College London, is running a competition to design the face of Kinba – the new King’s College London robotic receptionist in the Strand Campus, who will succeed the legendary, cheeky chatty robot receptionist Inkha. Inkha has been faithfully attending the Strand Campus reception for more than 10 years now, and…

Service Robots – Flexible Helpers in Professional Use at CoRe

Service robotics in Europe is on the rise. The market entrance of Google, the establishment of the “Robo-Stox” index in 2013, special reports in magazines such as “The Economist” or “Der Spiegel” show it: service robotics is on the threshold of entering a new maturity level. Service robotics conquers new, commercial fields of application and…

Impressions of the SCHUNK Expert Days 2014: Robots with Impact

In collaboration with SCHUNK, STIFF-FLOP showed a demonstration of their current state-of-the-art during the Expert Days 2014 in Hausen. This event is the world’s leading symposium for applied service robotics attended by more than 100 experts from all over the world, 18 international top-class speakers and 17 representatives of the international trade press this year.…

ICRA 2014 Workshop on Soft and Stiffness-controllable Robots for MIS

This workshop aims to bring together medical experts active in the field of minimally invasive surgery and roboticists creating and studying soft and stiffness controllable robot devices. We will explore the synergies that will arise from robotic surgeons cooperating with such modern robots to conduct advanced surgical interventions previously not possible. This ICRA 2014 workshop…