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Armed drones

14.08.2012

Ground robots are good because with the help of a robotic arm they can work with various objects. Flying robots are able to move quickly regardless of the terrain, but they cannot work with objects: they can only observe and, in extreme cases, destroy them with a rocket or an air bomb.

Drexel University engineers decided to significantly expand the capabilities of existing unmanned aerial vehicles and created a robotic arm that can be placed on a flying platform. Thanks to the manipulator, the drone will be able to hover over an object, such as an unexploded ordnance, pick it up and take it to a safe place. In industry, such UAVs can be used as loaders, in agriculture - for harvesting and pollinating plants, and in war - as "messengers" delivering information, equipment and ammunition.

The manipulator is a miniature crane with two grips, each with two fingers. The design provides reliable capture and deduction of objects of various shapes. Currently, this is just a prototype, for the completion of which the developers received a grant of $ 649999 from the National Science Foundation under the US government. In the near future, tests will begin that simulate lateral deviations and the effects of wind on a flying robot crane.

In the future, flying robots equipped with such a manipulator will be able to replace welders in dangerous areas, for example, when building bridges; rescuers when delivering food and medicine to stranded climbers; they will also be useful to the military, sailors, doctors, etc. The manipulator itself is scalable - for use on small or large UAVs, only software adaptation is required.

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Rat mutual assistance 22.05.2015

Scientists have established that nobility and empathy are inherent in the body of living beings from birth: the moral attitudes of society are secondary. Experiments to prove this were carried out on rats.

The ability of representatives of the world of fauna to empathy has been studied for a long time. So, in 2011, researchers from the University of Illinois at Chicago discovered the craving of rats to help each other. Some of the experimental rodents were placed in traps, and their "free" comrades made efforts and opened the latches. At the same time, American scientists concluded that rats do this in order not to get bored alone.

A new series of tests was conducted by specialists from Kwansei Gakuin University in Japan. The results are published in the journal Animal Cognition.

The experimental site was a specially designed box consisting of two isolated sections. Water was poured into one of the compartments, placing a rat there. These animals are known to be extremely uncomfortable in the water. The rat could not escape on its own, being in this section - all the possibilities for this were in the rat from the adjacent dry room. A few days after the start of the experiment, the rodents began to open the door, helping the rats floundering in the water. Moreover, the rats who had previously been in a water trap rushed to the aid of their comrade faster than those who had not yet encountered such a situation.

These experiments consolidated the observations of the Americans. The Japanese went further and refuted earlier conclusions. In those experiments, when both experimental rats were in adjacent dry compartments and did not suffer, they did not open the door - that is, they did not need friends as such.

Complicating the task, the scientists put the "dry" rats before a choice: either help a brother who was in the water, or receive a sweet reward. The results were amazing: in most cases, from 50% to 80%, the rats ignored the door, behind which lay a chocolate bar, instead opening the way to salvation for a comrade.

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