riken

Giant teddy bear robot can pick you off the floor

Being picked up and carried around by a giant teddy bear isn't something I've dreamed about lately, but Japanese researchers have achieved this fantasy with Riba II.

The latest generation of the ursine nursing robot is designed to help caregivers move increasing numbers of elderly patients who can't get around unaided.

Developed by the Riken research center and Tokai Rubber Industries, the new Robot for Interactive Body Assistance can now lift patients weighing up to 176 pounds, better than its previous load limit of 134 pounds.

It can also bend down and deposit or pick up patients on the floor. This is useful in Japan, where people often sleep on futon floor bedding or relax on floor tatami mats.

Riken says caregivers on average lift patients from floor bedding into wheelchairs 40 times a day, adding that the elderly nursing-care population in Japan will hit 5.69 million by 2015. … Read more

Fujitsu starts shipping next-gen supercomputer

Fujitsu has begun shipping the brains of a new Japanese supercomputer to be built at the government-funded RIKEN research institute and designed to perform 10 quadrillion mathematical calculations per second.

The system, called K, is massive. It's planned to have 800 racks of computing gear housing 80,000 of Fujitsu's SPARC 64 VIIIfx processors running at 2.2GHz, Fujitsu said. The processors will be interconnected with a high-capacity direct-connection network that permits fast communications between neighbors.

Although the system is under construction now, it won't be ready for production use until 2012, Fujitsu said.

The system initially … Read more

Japanese create teddy bear robot nurse

Japanese researchers have created a robot nurse that can lift elderly patients from wheelchairs and beds. Naturally, it looks like a giant teddy bear.

Riba, short for Robot for Interactive Body Assistance, was developed by the state-run Riken research center. Promoters are calling it the world's first robot to lift people in its arms.

Riba can move patients weighing up to 134 pounds in its foam-padded paws and transfer them from beds to wheelchairs. Its cute face is designed to make the 400-pound robot less imposing. Very kawaii.

Riba can also recognize faces and voices and respond to voice … Read more