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22 January 2007, 15:00
Sniper-finding robot RedOwl which will is controlled by a Xb
REDOWL SNIPER DETECTION ROBOT UNVEILED FOR ASSISTANT SECRETARY OF THE NAVY FOR RESEARCH, DEVELOPMENT AND ACQUISITION AT IROBOT HEADQUARTERS
 From the press release:
BU Photonics Center Deputy Director Dr. Glenn Thoren demonstrated acoustic-driven platform to Dr. Delores Etter
Leigh Hallisey
Kira Edler
The RedOwl is a robotic head that looks more like a PowerPoint projector than a sharpshooter's worst enemy. But don't let its Circuit City appearance fool you.
Controlled by a laptop-wielding soldier, the RedOwl's superior senses can read a nametag from across a football field and identify the make and model of a rifle fired a mile away simply by analyzing the sound of the distant blast.
 And soon it could be putting its powers to use in Iraq.
RedOwl's developer, Glenn Thoren, now a director at Insight Technology in Londonderry, New Hampshire, says several prototypes have finished an intensive 10-week field test at Fort Benning in Georgia.
 Given the defense department's budget approval early this year, he hopes the $150,000 sniper-finders will be in Iraq by this spring.
The robot's mechanical ears were originally designed to improve hearing aides. But Thoren, then with Boston University's Photonics Center, which heads the RedOwl project, thought up a new application after learning of a spike in sniper activity surrounding Iraqi hotspots like Abu Ghraib prison.
He combined the original listening system -- which processes sound received by four microphones to determine the direction and elevation of a noise -- with a suite of sensors, spotlights and a laser rangefinder.
 When the RedOwl hears gunfire, it swivels its head toward the source of the noise. A thermal imager can pick out the sniper while an infrared spotlight illuminates him for night-vision-equipped troops.
Attached to a PackBot, a miniature robot tank built by iRobot in Burlington, Massachusetts, and steered by a modified Xbox videogame controller, the RedOwl can also enter dangerous buildings in advance of soldiers.
"We're hoping to put the robot in situations where it would be less safe for a soldier," Thoren says.
Founded in 1839, Boston University is an internationally recognized institution of higher education and research. With more than 30,000 students, it is the fourth largest independent university in the United States. BU contains 17 colleges and schools along with a number of multi-disciplinary centers and institutes which are central to the school’s research and teaching mission.
SourceSee also: iRobot Unveils Programmable RobotU.S. soldiers in Iraq are forming emotional ties to Linux-powered robots, according to Reuters. iRobot's robots -- used for tasks such as explosives defusing and cave exploration -- are being given nicknames and winning loyalty, to the extent that soldiers request repairs for their favorites LAS VEGAS - (Business Wire) - iRobot Corp. (NASDAQ:IRBT) today unveiled iRobot(R) Create(TM), an affordable, programmable robot designed for aspiring roboticists, advanced high-school and college students, and serious robot developers. Create comes pre-assembled, so developers can design new robots without having to build a mobile robot from scratch. The latest robot is available at www.irobot.com and pricing starts at $129.99. Currently, iRobot robots perform 600 to 700 missions a day. The international news agency did not specify whether the robots are forming reciprocal emotional ties with soldiers "Innovators dream of creating useful robots, but they often get bogged down with designing a mobile platform that works," said Helen Greiner, co-founder and chairman of iRobot. "iRobot Create fills a need in the robot industry for a standard, durable hardware platform on which to rapidly develop new, innovative mobile robots." To date, the U.S. Navy has ordered about $43M worth of robots from iRobot, Reuters reports, while the Army has also ordered iRobot robots for its Future Combat Systems program. iRobot doubled its first-quarter revenue, to $38.2 million, compared to the year before. Create is based on the core technology of iRobot Roomba(R), the vacuuming robot that is cleaning millions of homes worldwide, and is compatible with Roomba's rechargeable batteries, remote control and other accessories. With Create, developers can now begin designing new robot applications out of the box. This new platform provides access to robot sensors and actuators via an open interface. Create also features standard connections for electronics and threaded mounting holes that allow users to secure their inventions to the robot, streamlining the integration of third-party electronics such as sensors, cameras, arms and wireless connections. iRobot's civilian robots are relatively simple devices that do not really need advanced computing intelligence, and hence probably do not run Linux. A variety of methods and programming languages can be used to control Create. Beginners can observe the robot's behavior in one of ten demonstration modes, or they can program the robot directly by downloading short scripts with any basic terminal program. More advanced users can write programs for completely autonomous robot behavior in C or C++ using the iRobot Command Module. Developers can also create custom software and interact with Create using a variety of methods including Microsoft Robotics Studio, a Windows-based development toolkit.
See also:
Mini-sub pulls through aerospace technology.BAE systems leads with Talisman at undersea defence technology Europe.RedbackTM is the first weapon system prototype...Next Generation Global HawkLockheed Martin wins contract to develop high altitude airship for missile defense, other missions.Top 10 robots selected for Robot Award 2006.HAL-5 - this astonishing device.
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