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Match the headings from the box below with the gaps in the following text.
| Telerobots Car production Home automation Space probes Automated guided vehicles Home automation for the elderly and disabled Packaging Dirty, dangerous, dull or inaccessible tasks Robotic surgery A robotic arm Electronics |
Nowadays the number of spheres where different types of robots are used is constantly increasing. The usage of different types of robots is as follows:
- (1) __________. Over the last three decades automobile factories have become dominated by robots. A typical factory contains hundreds of industrial robots working on fully automated production lines, with one robot for every ten human workers. On an automated production line, a vehicle chassis on a conveyor is welded, glued, painted and finally assembled at a sequence of robot stations.
- (2) __________ . Industrial robots are also used extensively for palletizing and packaging of manufactured goods, for example for rapidly taking drink cartons from the end of a conveyor belt and placing them into boxes, or for loading and unloading machining centers.
- (3) __________ . Mass-produced printed circuit boards (PCBs) are almost exclusively manufactured by pick-and-place robots, typically with SCARA manipulators, which remove tiny electronic components from strips or trays, and place them on to PCBs with great accuracy. Such robots can place hundreds of thousands of components per hour, far out-performing a human in speed, accuracy, and reliability.
- (4) __________ (AGVs). Mobile robots, following markers or wires in the floor, or using vision or lasers, are used to transport goods around large facilities, such as warehouses, container ports, or hospitals.
- (5)__________ . There are many jobs which humans would rather leave to robots. The job may be boring, such as domestic cleaning, or dangerous, such as exploring inside a volcano. Other jobs are physically inaccessible, such as exploring another planet, cleaning the inside of a long pipe, or performing laparoscopic surgery.
- (6)__________ . Almost every unmanned space probe ever launched was a robot. Some were launched in the 1960s with more limited abilities, but their ability to fly and to land (in the case of Luna 9) is an indication of their status as a robot. This includes the Voyager probes and the Galileo probes, as well as other probes.
- (7) __________ . When a human cannot be present on site to perform a job because it is dangerous, far away, or inaccessible, teleoperated robots, or telerobots are used. Rather than following a predetermined sequence of movements, a telerobot is controlled from a distance by a human operator. The robot may be in another room or another country, or may be on a very different scale to the operator. For instance, a laparoscopic surgery robot allows the surgeon to work inside a human patient on a relatively small scale compared to open surgery, significantly shortening recovery time. When disabling a bomb, the operator sends a small robot to disable it. Teleoperated robot aircraft, like the Predator Unmanned Aerial Vehicle, are increasingly being used by the military. These pilotless drones can search terrain and fire on targets.
- (8)__________. As prices fall and robots become smarter and more autonomous, simple robots dedicated to a single task work in over a million homes. They are taking on simple but unwanted jobs, such as vacuum cleaning and floor washing, and lawn mowing. Some find these robots to be cute and entertaining, which is one reason that they can sell very well.
- (9) __________. The population is aging in many countries, especially Japan, meaning that there are increasing numbers of elderly people to care for, but relatively fewer young people to care for them. Humans perform the best care, but where they are unavailable, robots are gradually being introduced. For example, the care-providing robot FRIEND is a semi-autonomous robot designed to support disabled and elderly people in their daily life activities, like preparing and serving a meal, or reintegration in professional life. FRIEND makes it possible for such people, e.g. patients which are paraplegic, have muscle diseases or serious paralysis, e.g. due to strokes, to perform special tasks in daily life self-determined and without help from other people like therapists or nursing staff. The robot FRIEND is the third generation of such robots developed at the Institute of Automation (IAT) of University of Bremen within different research projects.
- (10) __________. It is the use of robots in performing surgery. Three major advances aided by surgical robots have been remote surgery, minimally invasive surgery and unmanned surgery. Some major advantages of robotic surgery are precision, miniaturization, smaller incisions, decreased blood loss, less pain, and quicker healing time. Further advantages are articulation beyond normal manipulation and 3D (three-dimensional) magnification, resulting in improved ergonomics.
- (11)__________ . It is a robot manipulator, usually programmable, with similar functions to a human arm. The links of such a manipulator are connected by joints allowing either rotational motion (such as in an articulated robot) or translational (linear) displacement. The links of the manipulator can be considered to form a kinematic chain. The business end of the kinematic chain of the manipulator is called the end effector and it is analogous to the human hand. The end effector can be designed to perform any desired task such as welding, gripping, spinning etc., depending on the application. For example robot arms in automotive assembly lines perform a variety of tasks such as welding and parts rotation and placement during assembly. The robot arms can be autonomous or controlled manually and can be used to perform a variety of tasks with great accuracy. The robotic arm can be fixed or mobile (i.e. wheeled) and can be designed for industrial or home applications.
- Robots can also be found in the military.
POTENTIAL PROBLEMS
Read the following text and fill in the gaps with the words from the box:
| films software computers programmed humans |
Vernor Vinge has suggested that a moment may come when (1) __________ and robots are smarter than humans. He calls this "the Singularity." He suggests that it may be somewhat or possibly very dangerous for (2) __________ . This is discussed by a philosophy called Singularitarianism.
Fears and concerns about robots can be found in a wide range of books and (3) __________ . A common theme is the development of a master race of conscious and highly intelligent robots, motivated to take over or destroy the human race. (See The Terminator, Runaway, Blade Runner, Robocop, the Replicators in Stargate, the Cylons in Battlestar Galactica, The Matrix, THX-1138, and I, Robot.) Some fictional robots are (4) __________ to kill and destroy; others gain superhuman intelligence and abilities by upgrading their own (5) __________ and hardware. Examples of popular media where the robot becomes evil are 2001: A Space Odyssey, Red Planet, ... Another common theme is the reaction, sometimes called the "uncanny valley", of unease and even revulsion at the sight of robots that mimic humans too closely. Frankenstein (1818), often called the first science fiction novel, has become synonymous with the theme of a robot or monster advancing beyond its creator. In the TV show, Futurama, the robots are portrayed as humanoid figures that live alongside humans, not as robotic butlers. They still work in industry, but these robots carry out daily lives.
ROBOTICS
Read the following text and fill in the gaps with the words from the box:
| mechanical manufactures designs disciplines scientists engineering companies planning production control consultant students |
Robotics is a new science connected with the design, (1) __________ and software maintenance of robots. Nowadays robotics is paid great attention by the (2) __________ all over the world. Many countries have companies handling the problems of robotics. And in some countries robotics has even been introduced into the lives of elementary and high school (3)__________ .
A person involved in the process of robotics development is called a roboticist. He (4)__________ , builds, programs, and experiments with robots. Since robotics is a highly interdisciplinary field, roboticists often have backgrounds in a number of (5) __________ including computer science, (6) __________ engineering, electrical (7) __________ , and computer engineering. Roboticists often work for university, industry, and government research labs, but may also work for startup companies and other firms.
Universal Robotics, Inc, is one of software engineering (8) __________ that develops, (9)__________ , and supports an operating system for machine intelligence. Headquartered at Smith Springs in Nashville, Tennessee, Universal Robotics was co-founded by professor Dr. Alan Peters, of the Center for Intelligent Systems in the School of Engineering at Vanderbilt University and his brothers David Peters, a businessman, and Jonathan Peters, an IT (10) __________ . The company was incorporated as a holding company on August 29, 2001. Universal is a hybrid of functional and product organizational structures. There are six task areas: 1) strategic (11) __________ , 2) sales and service of customers, 3) engineering and programming, 4) quality (12) __________ , 5) research and development, and 6) security.