robot

The robot with which they want to explore the tunnels of Mars is a ball bug stuffed with dandelion drones

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The human being has been sending rovers to Mars for 30 years. We know a lot about its surface, but there are still many unexplored regions. A good example is its tunnels. The red planet has the largest known network of tunnels in the solar system, but there has been no vehicle capable of entering them and exploring them from within. Therefore, a team of scientists from the New Mexico Institute of Mining and Technology takes several years working on a most original solution: sending a ball bug robot, filled with dandelion drones, to the caves. It sounds very strange, but it makes sense. Biomimetics to enter the tunnels. Professor Mostafa Hassanalian, from New Mexico Tech, has been working on this project for several years, but recently the topic has returned to the networks after he gave statements to space. In them he tells them, in broad strokes, the objective of his research. This is based on biomimetics. That is, in the development of technologies inspired by nature. Specifically, it aims to develop two types of drones: one inspired by scale insects and another that works like dandelion plants. The mealybug, known colloquially as a ball bug, can enter small places and protect its own body by shrinking into a ball. In this case it protects its interior, because it has hidden a lot of tiny robots that spread through the air like dandelion seeds. The problem. Mars is full of tunnels of volcanic origin. Some have been found extending up to 1,200 kilometers, with lava tubes more than 250 meters in diameter. They are not exactly small tunnels. The rovers currently on Mars, such as Curiosity either Perseverancethey do not have the ability to enter these tunnels. Therefore, if there is something interesting, we will not be able to know it until humans travel to the red planet. If what is there is dangerous, it is better to see it before entering. Methods are needed to see inside those tunnels. The solution. Hassanalian’s team has come up with two types of robots. On the one hand, the one that imitates the cochineal is a sphere that can be inserted through a hole dug in the ceiling of the tunnels. Once inside these, the ball opens, like a cochineal that stops turning into a ball, and releases its contents: thousands of small, very light drones, which can travel kilometers away thanks to the wind. Limitations overcome. These types of devices would encounter several obstacles, for which Hassanalian has already thought of a solution. The first would be that we have no idea if there will be enough wind inside the tunnels. We know that Mars can be very windy, reaching 100 kilometers per hour. However, the tunnels could be guarded. Therefore, this scientist plans to incorporate a fan in the main robot to help propel the mini dandelion drones. In addition, the holes that would be made in the ceiling to introduce the robot would help propel the little seeds. On the other hand, sunlight cannot access the interior of the tunnels, so they could not be powered by solar energy. This is solved using piezoelectricity. That is to say, materials that generate electricity when subjected to mechanical pressure. Multitude of sensors. The drones will be loaded with humidity and temperature sensors that will allow the internal conditions of the tunnels to be analyzed. In addition, they would also help map the conduits and make a plan of the Martian tunnel network. All of this would be sent to researchers via radio signals. At the moment, these two types of robots have not been built or tested, but the idea is very promising. With enough funding to make it happen, we would have a very ingenious solution to look into those blind spots on the red planet. And all thanks to an animal and a plant from our own planet. Image | MagnificentDave Huth | Nex México Tech. In Xataka | Elon Musk says it will take 1,000 Starships and 20 years to build the first sustainable city on Mars

The robot vacuum cleaner that climbs stairs is real, it arrives in Spain and no, it is not a robot vacuum cleaner

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Robot vacuum cleaners are capable of navigating without getting lost, removing socks with one arm, take out the paw to better clean the corners and even clean themselves. They do a lot of things, more and more, but what none of them did until now was climb stairs. Due to their very format, robot vacuum cleaners have been limited to solid floors. Then Dreame arrived, said “hold my bucket” and launched the Cyber ​​X, a conceptual robot vacuum cleaner that was capable of climbing stairs using caterpillars. At IFA 2025 they taught the conceptthen they turned it to exhibit at CES of this year and today, at last, we can say that it is no longer conceptual. Is a finished productdefinitive, with release date and price in Spain. And no, although it may seem like it, it is not a robot vacuum cleaner, but rather an accessory for robot vacuum cleaners. Stairs up, stairs down This is a conventional robot vacuum cleaner. With those wheels you can overcome an obstacle, but not a step | Image: Xataka As a general rule, a robot vacuum cleaner has two rear wheels that propel it forward and make it pivot by playing with the speeds or direction of travel. Some have a lifting system that allows them to overcome small obstacles, such as a curb, but none usually exceed eight to ten centimeters. What has Dreame done? Inspired by tanks to launch not a robot vacuum cleaner that climbs stairs, but an attachment with four tracks in which the robot vacuum cleaner is attached to overcome the stairs. The Cyber addonan additional product to the robot vacuum cleaner, which makes all the sense in the world if we think about using it in the long term. Few product categories have evolved as much in such a short time as robot vacuum cleaners. Putting legs on a single model makes no sense while, probably, it would be outdated in a few years. Putting it on an accessory that a robot vacuum fits into is simply a much better idea. This is what the Cyber ​​X looks like without any robot vacuum cleaner inside | Image: Dreame And this is what it looks like with a robot inside | Image: Dreame How does it work? The device has four rubber tracks, an independent ladder vision and detection system, and its own charging base. When the robot vacuum cleaner has to climb stairs, it approaches the Cyber But the robot does not move, the accessory moves. The robot is simply a passenger inside. When it reaches a ladder, the Cyber speed of 0.2 meters per second. It takes 27 seconds to climb a step, according to the company, and supports all types of stairs: straight, L-shaped, with floating steps and spirals. It may not seem very fast, but it is faster than what was available until now, which was nothing. In theory, the robot can overcome all types of stairs | Image: Dreame Upon reaching the top, the Cyber the robot undockscleaning as normal. When finished, the robot returns to the Cyber ​​X and can either go up another floor (it can accommodate up to four floors) or go down. It is when it goes down that the Cyber ​​X shows another of its tricks: it is capable of sweeping and vacuuming the steps. On the inside of the rear track there is two little arms with two brushes that sweep the dust and the dirt on the steps. This moves towards a vacuum cleaner with 6,000 Pa of power located in the rear, which in turn is directly connected to a HEPA filter and the dust container of the robot vacuum cleaner that is a passenger. On the back there are little brushes to clean the steps as you go down | Image: Dreame When it reaches the end, the robot activates a soft landing system, so that the front track rests gently on the ground while the rear track descends the last step. This prevents sudden hits on the ground. If necessary, the robot has a braking system that allows it to stop if it detects pets or people while going up or down. Versions and price of the Dreame Cyber He Cyber It will have a price of 1,199 euros to which the cost of the robot vacuum cleaner will have to be added. In this first phase, the Cyber ​​X is only compatible with the series Dreame X60 Pro (all models regardless of the type of mop), whose cheapest model costs 1,499 euros. It is, by all accounts, a premium product at a premium product price. It will be launched in September of this year. Images | Dreame In Xataka | Best robot vacuum cleaners in quality price. Which one to buy based on use and six recommended models

While we continue planning how to colonize the Moon, China already has a bricklayer robot to start building a base

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If we talk about lunar exploration we immediately think of the Artemis programbut the United States is not the only country pushing towards the colonization of our satellite. China also has a program underway and they just showed off a new lunar rover with four wheels and a humanoid upper body. Your job will be to assist in the collection of samples, transportation and deployment of instruments, something like a porter mason. What exactly is it. It is a robot weighing about 100kg with a lower part with four wheels and a humanoid torso with two arms on the upper part. It is not a typical scientific rover, but Its main function is to act as a carrierpicking up and placing different objects and instruments in their positions. The hybrid design, with wheels to move and arms to manipulate, responds to a specific need: on the Moon there are no operators who can move equipment, connect sensors or install instruments. Someone has to do it, and that someone is going to be this robot. Technical challenges. The robot is equipped with AI systems, remote vision and 3D mapping to be able to function in a totally unknown environment. The team that developed it, led by the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, has South China Morning Post that the main challenge is to ensure that both arms move in a coordinated and precise manner to manipulate fragile instruments. On Earth it is already a complex task, but here you will have to do it in a hostile environment with extreme temperatures, uneven terrain and no one who can repair a possible breakdown. To operate, the robot is powered by solar energy and is designed to operate for two years on the lunar surface, which implies that it will spend 24 lunar nights, each of more than 14 Earth days. During these periods, as it does not receive sunlight, the robot will have to enter a hibernation state and wake up at the beginning of a new day. The mission. The robot is part of the Chang’e-8 missionscheduled for 2028-2029. It will be the eighth mission of the series Chang’e, which China has been using since 2007 to progressively explore the Moon: first orbiters, then landers, rovers and sample collection. The goal of the Chang’e-8 mission is to deliver materials and begin preparing the ground for a permanent presence at the lunar south pole. That’s why the robot is not only designed to explore, but also works. Chang’e-8 is a key part of the International Lunar Research Station (ILRS), the joint project of China and Russia to build a base on the Moon using 3D printing techniques. Why the south pole. The choice of location is not accidental. The lunar south pole has great strategic importance for space agencies because It is where reserves of water ice have been discovered in its craters. That ice has the potential to become fuel, oxygen and water for any permanent base. Whoever arrives first, learns to navigate the terrain and installs more instruments will have a huge advantage. That is why both Chang’e-8 and Artemis III go to the same region. Image | Xataka with Gemini In Xataka | China’s most ambitious space project: an advanced hyperspectral satellite to make a “CT” of the Earth

send a robot with a 300 kilo surprise

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In 1944, during the Warsaw Uprising, some Polish fighters improvised small remote controlled vehicles loaded with explosives to try to destroy German positions without exposing directly to his men. Those rudimentary machines could barely move through the rubble and many ended up unusable before reaching the objective… but they left an idea floating that the battlefield would take decades to recover: perhaps one day the first troops to enter an enemy building would not be soldiers. The new way to assault a building. For decades, clearing an enemy-occupied building was one of the most important tasks. most brutal and dangerous of any war: advancing through rooms, stairs and basements while each door could hide an ambush. They counted in Forbes that Ukraine is beginning to completely change that logic. In Kostiantynivka, Russian troops hiding in an abandoned block were probably waiting for drones arriving from the sky. What appeared It was something different: an unmanned ground vehicle that entered from the rear loaded with 300 kilos of explosives before to detonate the building. The operation, coordinated with other ground robots and support drones, perfectly summarizes where urban warfare is evolving. Ukraine is no longer just using drones to observe or launch small grenades: it is converting kamikaze robots on wheels in assault tools capable of partially replacing the infantry in the most suicidal missions on the front. Coordinated machine warfare. The most important aspect of this evolution is not only the explosive robot, but the way in which starts to combine with aerial drones, sensors and recognition systems. Ukraine is developing a kind of “robotic mixed war” where each machine meets a different function. Aerial drones locate targets, monitor routes and provide an overview of combat, and ground robots advance close to the ground carrying machine guns, mines, supplies or huge explosive charges directly to Russian positions. That cooperation resolves many of the individual limitations of each system. Flying drones have speed and vision, but they can barely carry weight. Ground robots are slow and vulnerable, but can move loads capable of destroying an entire basement or opening breaches impossible for a conventional FPV. The result is a battlefield where different machines begin to act as a coordinated unit which increasingly replaces tasks traditionally reserved for soldiers. Robots to save soldiers. Behind this transformation there is also a much harsher reality: Ukraine needs to reduce the exhibition of his infantry. After years of war of attrition against a larger Russian army, each urban assault has become an extremely difficult human cost to bear. That is why terrestrial robots are rapidly moving from being experimental tools to becoming a real tactical need. Initially they were used mainly to transport ammunition, evacuate wounded or clear mines, but pressure from the front and the proliferation of drones have accelerated their evolution. towards offensive functions direct. Zelensky, in fact, has already ordered tens of thousands of UGVs for this year and kyiv’s stated objective is to automate even a good part of the logistics of the front. In other words: Ukraine is trying to progressively replace people with machines where the chances of survival begin. to be too low. The terror of “Baba Yaga”. Already we have talked of him before. In parallel to these ground robots, Ukraine has also developed an increasingly sophisticated psychological dimension around its aerial drones. The most symbolic case is that of the Vampire, the famous hexacopter named by the Russians. as “Baba Yaga”. Its nocturnal sound has become a real tool of terror on the front. In Sumy, for example, a Vampire managed rescue two soldiers Ukrainians captured after locating their captors, identifying them using thermal cameras and bombing them as they fled. Beyond the spectacular nature of the episode, the drone represents something much more important: the combination between cheap technology, ease of use and enormous operational flexibility. For a few thousand euros, Ukraine has a platform capable of launching anti-tank mines, transporting supplies, resisting electronic jamming and coordinating with other robotic systems on the ground. The consequence is that Russian soldiers begin to face a constant threat that can appear from the sky, from a window or from an apparently empty street. The battlefield of the future. The war in Ukraine is accelerating a military transformation that other militaries will study for years. The most striking thing is not only the proliferation of drones, but how these platforms are starting to physically replace Complete combat functions. A terrestrial robot loaded with explosives Entering a fortified building was a few years ago an image typical of military laboratories or science fiction films, but now it is part of real operations in destroyed cities of Donbas. At the same time, the combination of fiber optics, jam-resistant navigation, and machine-to-machine coordination is making it increasingly difficult to neutralize these systems with conventional electronic warfare. Ukraine continues to lose many of these robots to Russian FPV drones, but even that reinforces the industrial logic of the conflict: destroying machines is more acceptable than losing soldiers experienced. If you also want, little by little, urban warfare begins to look less like the battles of the 20th century and more like an environment saturated with autonomous systems where the first units that come into contact with the enemy are no longer people, but robots loaded with explosives observed from a distance from a screen. Image | x In Xataka | To achieve the milestone of building the largest drone industry without China, Ukraine has found an explosive ally: Taiwan In Xataka | The war in Ukraine is being filled with “Mad Max” ships: metal screens and nets against FPV drones in the Black Sea

This is the robot that the creator of the Roomba has been wanting to develop for 30 years

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Colin Angle, co-founder of iRobot, left the company in a somewhat abrupt manner after the breakdown of the Amazon agreement. However, the topic of home robotics has never disappeared from his mind, and in fact it has returned with a somewhat peculiar proposal. Does not clean floors. It has four legs, moving ears and is designed to make you get attached to it. The story behind the return. Angle left iRobot in 2024, after the failure of its sale to Amazon and after almost three decades at the head of the company. Shortly after, he founded Familiar Machines & Magic with Ira Renfrew and Chris Jones, two iRobot veterans. Last week at the Wall Street Journal’s Future of Everything conference, he unveiled his first creation: a furry-looking quadruped robot they call “Familiar.” According to they counted told the WSJ, the choice of name comes from modern European folklore, where the term was used to describe supernatural animals that accompanied witches. What exactly is it. The truth is that it is difficult to classify. He does not speak, he is not a smart speaker with legs, and it is not a typical robotic pet either (despite having a similar size). It has 23 degrees of freedom that allow you to move your head, neck, ears, eyes and eyebrows. It walks on all fours at a calm pace, cannot climb stairs or grab objects, and its communication with the user is completely non-verbal: it meows, purrs and expresses emotions through its body and face. “By design, you will avoid giving factual advice on things that perhaps you shouldn’t give factual advice on,” explained Angle to The Verge, in a direct reference to the problems that chatbots based on large language models have. Its face has been designed unrelated to any specific animal, and this decision is deliberate, because if the robot looked like a dog or a cat, the user would bring preconceived expectations that the robot might not be able to meet. So, yes, it is a somewhat complicated pet to describe. What technology does it have inside? According to those responsible, the Familiar works with the chip Jetson Orin from Nvidia and a small, custom multimodal AI model that processes vision, audio, language and memory directly on the device, without sending data to the cloud. It has a camera, microphone and a touch-sensitive touch casing. It can work without an internet connection. Morgan Pope, creative director of the company and former researcher at Disney Research, points out in an interview with IEEE Spectrum that were two recent advances that made the project viable: the use of reinforcement learning to achieve fluid movement without very expensive hardware, and the Generative AIwhich, in his words, “is perfect here because it creates the plausible assumption of intelligence, which helps the character feel coherent and alive.” What is it for and who is it for? Curiously, the Familiar is not intended as a toy or as a home assistant. Its purpose, according to the companyis to reinforce healthy routines and actively accompany its user. Angle focuses above all on families with small children, older people who live alone or people who want to better manage their well-being. The robot observes, learns and acts. The example that has been given is that, if it detects that you have been looking at your mobile screen for too long, it will try to get you to pay attention to it. Or if someone comes into the house carrying bags and in a hurry, they will know how to stay still and not get too angry. AI is not designed to always obey you. “Training him to obey you perfectly would break the illusion that he has his own personality,” Angle explained. to IEEE Spectrum. The goal is for the robot to have its own goals, not to execute orders. A history of failures. The trajectory of companion robots for the home has not been very encouraging to date. Jibo, Kuri, Anki Vectorhe Aibo original from Sony… they all promised something similar and they have all ended up being discontinued. The common denominator of their failures always ends up being the same: entertaining the first few days until they are forgotten in a closet. Angle thinks AI can change the equation here. “If this ends up being a toy, we will have failed. If it is a creature you want in your world, we will have succeeded,” counted to The Verge. We have questions. The robotic mascot presented at the WSJ event was a prototype that they controlled partially remotely, but Angle promise which will hit the market completely autonomously in 2027. The price, for now, is vaguely described as “similar to the cost of having a pet”, a range so wide that in practice it says nothing. On the other hand, carrying a camera and microphone always on around your home raises some questions about privacy. Although the team states that data is not shared in the cloud, these are issues worth keeping in mind. And now what. Familiar Machines & Magic has brought together talent from Disney Research, Boston Dynamics, MIT, Bose and Sonos. Angle has been wanting to build artificial life for thirty years since the time when iRobot’s original name was, precisely, Artificial Creatures Inc. The technology that did not exist then now exists. So now we need to know if they can materialize that promise into something that people want to have in their living room. Images | Familiar Machines & Magic In Xataka | The end of Nvidia in China seems to be very near: its current market share is 0%

Amazon was already using robots like crazy. Now you have a 42-inch humanoid robot that dances and picks up toys from the floor

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Amazon has been using robots in its logistics centers for years, but although these robots have demonstrated a brutal automation capacity for certain processes, they were “limited” to moving boxes and managing orders. Last week this technology giant took another step in this area: acquired the company Fauna Roboticsa New York startup developing a humanoid home robot called Sprout. Now the question is: what will Amazon do with it? Hello, Sprout.. The Fauna robot has a very different profile from the industrial robots that until now dominated Amazon’s logistics centers. It is not designed for factories, but for living rooms and kitchens. The startup describes it as a housework assistant. If the children don’t clean up the room, he will do it. Sprout is able to pick up toys from the floor, bring food from the pantry, and interact with children and pets. It works when you call it by name, it recognizes faces, it creates a memory over time and it has an interchangeable battery with an autonomy of about three hours. Its current price: $50,000, and its “heart” is NVIDIA’s Jetson Orin robotics platform. From Astro to Sprout. In September 2021, Amazon presented AStro, a home robot that I wanted to be more than just an Alexa on wheels. That model hardly caught on and in fact raised certain suspicions about the threat posed to privacy. The difference with Sprout is that this robot has limbs and instead of “rolling” it walks. It also has social interaction capabilities that Astro did not have. Alexa+, candidate to be part of Sprout. Amazon has been trying to boost its ecosystem with AI solutions for a long time, and its latest attempt is Alexa+an intelligent assistant whose deployment is being especially gradual. Months after its launch, it is still available on a limited basis in some company products such as your Echo speakers or your Echo Show smart displays. The question is whether this new assistant will be an integral part of Sprout. An increasingly lively race. The acquisition of Fauna makes Amazon the latest major protagonist in a race in which more and more large technology companies are involved. Tesla has Optimus, for example, while others like Figure AI or Boston Dynamics are aiming high. Apple, Meta and Google have expressed interest in this field, although none have presented specific projects and they are all rumors. A decade ago everyone wanted to have smart speakers. Now everyone wants to have humanoid robots, but there is a problem. China. Although Western companies are advancing, those that are clearly leading the way in this market are Chinese humanoid robots. The Asian giant manufactures 90% of the world’s humanoid robotsand the spectacular demonstrations that we have seen in recent months seem make clear that their progress is really promising. Unknowns. At the moment Amazon does not seem to be clear about the marketing of these robots. Fauna will maintain its name and apparently some independence. Its 50 employees will join Amazon, but Amazon will not use Sprout for its logistics operations and has not confirmed whether it will be sold to end users. It seems more of a bet on the technology of Fauna and his team, and a more defensive move. If humanoid robots end up taking off, Amazon has a good starting point here. Image | Wildlife Robotics In Xataka | We have been living with robots for years that beat us at chess. Now we have robots that beat us at tennis

The largest data centers on the planet are guarded by dogs. By robot dogs

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The deployment of data centers to train the artificial intelligence It is a sign of technological power, but also economic power. This year alone, the big Americans are going to let themselves more money than NASA invested to take man to the Moon. More than $670 billion between Meta, Amazon, Microsoft and Google to create gigantic data centers. And within that investment, an important part is in safety with dogs. With robot dogs, specifically. It is the culmination of science fiction dystopia. In short. In the age of AI, data centers are the holy grail. We are continually seeing how companies sign contracts for thousands of million dollars with NVIDIA either amd (especially with NVIDIA) to provide them with the platforms with which to train their models. It’s only part of the equation, as there is another monumental investment in power, storage, RAM, dissipation and everything necessary to make these small cities work. Within the investment, there is security, and in BI They have published a report in which they detail that, within the budget, there are companies that are already including spending on robots that patrol both the perimeter and the internal corridors. The goal is security in every sense: patrol to detect threats, but also to identify any problems that occur with the equipment before they escalate and become something more serious. brand dogs. In the report, two companies are pointed out: Boston Dynamics and its dog Spot (with which we were able to play a few years ago) and Ghost Robotics with your Vision 60. Since Boston Dynamicsthe company owned by hyundai For a few years now, they have told the American media that they have been visiting data centers for some time because there is great interest. “We have seen an increase in interest in data centers in the last year, which is probably not surprising given the investment in that space,” Merry Frayne, the company’s senior director of product management, tells the outlet. For these companies, it is tremendous advertising, but also a potential customer in a “new” sector. Because it is possible that the police do not have the budget to get hold of many, but within the billions that are invested in data centers, dogs are just another sheet in the accounting excel. You can mount the sensor you want ‘Patrolling the center. And what is your task? Well… quite a task, really. The representative of Boston Dynamics, and other operators, point out that the dogs are not limited to acting as a “mobile surveillance camera”, but have other tasks: Patrol exterior perimeters to ensure that there are no problems with fences and accesses. Walk through server rooms, cooling rooms, and power rooms to look for anomalies such as water leaks, hot spots that may indicate a short circuit, or accumulations of moisture. Also sensors to detect gases, microphones to analyze noise and, ultimately, the sensor you want to put on it. Capture visual data from everything, such as analog pressure gauges or level indicators. Constantly, and as some robot vacuum cleaners do, map with LiDAR as they pass to see that there are no elements out of place. Some specific centers in which they are already being tested are Novva Data Centers in Utah or Oracle at the Industry Lab in Chicago. And dogs, in addition to cameras, have all kinds of thermal sensors and even conversational interfaces based on models like ChatGPT to interact with people. Measurement of noise levels Object identification Thermal sensors Compensate. It’s really nothing new. We have already seen robot dogs in other industrial sectors such as oil, mining or manufacturing. security forces. In China, in fact, there are deploying to assist firefighters in extreme situations or in institutesbut if in those scenarios they are seen as a tool, here they seem more like a substitute. Because there are those who have done the math and, in a market like the American one, a couple of full-time human guards can cost about $300,000 annually. The initial cost of a Spot ranges from $175,000 to $300,000, depending on the equipment. The cost of a Vision 60 is $165,000. And, as we see, they do much more than a security guard by being full of sensors. Frayne says, “Clients typically start to see a payback on their investment in about 18 months.” Michael Subhan, business director at Ghost Robotics, comments that “instead of having two human guards for $300,000, you can have one human guard and one robot.” A Spots battery charging. And it’s better, since it lasts less than two hours with the standard battery They also get tired. These robots also have their needs. They need to change batteries and install charging points and the environment must be well structured so that the routes are efficient and the sensors such as the LiDAR work well. They can climb stairs and avoid obstacles, but performance suffers in other environments and, in addition, the placement of fixed cameras and sensors in the building must be planned. That is to say, it seems that it is not as easy as saying “I build the center however I want, buy four robodogs and it will work”, but rather that you have to plan the traditional elements and the dogs to achieve a good integration. who are you HUGE Market. Although we have discussed two specific cases in which these robo-guardian dogs are being tested, both Boston Dynamics and Ghost Robotics have not gone into more details. In the end, it is security, and this falls within confidentiality agreements. Boston Dynamics points out that it is an “emerging market.” And Subhan has mentioned that “in the United States alone there are 5,000 data centers and 800 to 1,000 are currently being built, so we see it as a great market for us.” According to some estimatesthe market for robot dogs and industrial drones is currently around 500,000 units, but is expected to double by 2030, generating a market of 21 billion … Read more

robot vs robot battles where humans only watch

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In the year 2024, a relevant event occurred in the context of the war in Ukraine. So the number of drones produced for military use far surpassed to that of traditional armored vehicles, with tens of thousands of units deployed on the front. That change not only reflected a question of cost, but a profound transformation in how a modern war is conceived and fought today. One where humans have less and less to say. Forbidden to humans. In Ukraine, a new type of battlefield has emerged that breaks with everything known: the called “kill zones”those strips of several kilometers where any movement is detected and destroyed almost instantly by swarms of drones. In these spaces, human presence has become extremely limited and dangerous, almost inaccessible, forcing soldiers to remain buried for weeks or months and move alone in exceptional conditionswhile the terrain between the lines becomes a kind of permanent “no man’s land”, one saturated with sensors, mines and constant surveillance. If in the 19th century battles and quarrels were fought with steps and guns in duels in the sunTwo centuries later, duels have mutated into disputes between machines. Wars without troops. I remembered a few weeks ago the financial times that, in this new environment, direct combat between people has ceased to be the central element, replaced by confrontations where machines take center stage. Aerial drones patrol, detect and attack targets continuously, while unmanned ground vehicles advance, hold positions or execute ambushes in places where an infantryman I couldn’t survive. There have even been documented situations in which systems from both sides confront each other without direct human presenceevidencing a qualitative change in the nature of combat. Robots against robots. The most striking result is the appearance of authentic “duels” between unmanned systems, where UAVs and UGVs search, hunt and they destroy each other. Drones waiting on the ground like smart mines, vehicles that ambush routes supply or systems specifically designed to locate and neutralize other robots reflect an autonomous combat dynamic in constant evolution. Thus, each advance generates an immediate response from the adversary, creating a cycle accelerated innovation which is more reminiscent of a technological ecosystem or a futuristic war video game than a conventional war. Fully automated logistics. Even tasks that historically defined the rear, such as supplies, evacuation or minelaying, have been absorbed and replaced by machines. Now drones transport food, water and ammunition, while ground vehicles extract wounded people or deploy explosives in inaccessible areas. This change, furthermore, is not only tactical, but rather structural, because the battlefield seems not to admit The human presence continues, forcing a kind of outsourcing of essential functions to systems that can take risks that no soldier could accept. The leap to self-employment. They explained in Forbes that, although many of these systems continue to depend on human operators, the trend points towards a increasing autonomywith robots increasingly capable of detecting, deciding and acting with less intervention. If you also want, the integration of artificial intelligence, advanced sensors and coordination in swarms anticipates a scenario where hundreds of systems operate simultaneously in air, land and sea, further expanding these inaccessible areas and reducing the room for human maneuver. The future in real time. In summary, what is happening in Ukraine It is not only an adaptation to the current conflict, but it could be said that it is a preview of what they will be like. the wars of the future. The unprecedented combination of total surveillance, combat automation and progressive replacement of the soldier in the most dangerous areas is transforming war in an unprecedented confrontation between systemsone where humans are relegated to supervision and strategic decision-making. From that perspective, rather than a gradual evolution, the conflict in Eastern Europe has suddenly accelerated a transition that seemed very distant a few years ago, turning science fiction into something similar to an operational reality. Image | Telegram In Xataka | Ukraine has become the world’s leading specialist against Iranian drones. And he won’t share his antidote In Xataka | If Ukraine promoted the use of drones, Iran has triggered the Terminator algorithm. And that was already a problem in science fiction

We have been looking for fire hydrants in photos for years to prove that we are not a robot. Turns out we were the robot after all

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It happens to us every day: we try to enter a website and suddenly a grid of poor quality photos requires us to identify all the traffic lights, buses or even fire hydrants even though in Spain, for example, they do not have the characteristic design that is applied in the US. When we solve these puzzles we are not only proving that we are not a robot: we are working for Google. Google slaves. In the early 2000s, bots were destroying the internet, but a young man named Luis von Ahn had a great idea to stop them. Believe CAPTCHAa system that forced us to identify distorted words to prove that we were human and thus be able to access the content. That system evolved and Google bought the idea and turned it into a perfect system for something we have barely noticed: working for it. From Google Maps to Waymo. Since then, Google has not stopped taking advantage of the system for two intertwined objectives. The first, effectively, protect us from bots. The second, also known but much juicier for the company, is to turn us all into information taggers. Internet users first recognized words and became a gigantic OCR system that was applied to Google Maps. Then, with images, we ended up helping Google’s image recognition systems improve significantly. That has served, among other things, to feed the Waymo autonomous driving systems. Statistical consensus. How does Google know that when we choose a fire hydrant or a bus we are responding correctly? It knows this through the so-called “statistical consensus.” Google usually presents images in pairs: one of them (the control image) has already been previously identified by thousands of people, while the other is an “orphan” image that its computer vision algorithms cannot decipher. If you guess the known one, Google assumes you are human and uses your answer about the unknown image to feed its database. We are the product. All of our readers were probably already very aware of this reality, but now a debate is beginning to activate about the ethics and ownership of digital work. It is something that we already saw with social networks, which were fed by our content, and that certainly also applies to Google: to what extent is it legal for a company to have a huge AI infrastructure thanks to the billions of hours of unpaid “microwork” of its users? Here the famous “If you don’t pay for the product, you are the product.“. It is true that these Google systems have protected us from bots and we have not paid for them “with money”… but with those micro-jobs that we have carried out when solving the puzzles of the reCAPTACHA systems. Is it possible to poison the algorithm? Here also doubts arise about the true reliability of the system. If a mass group of users decided to mislabel traffic lights or fire hydrants in an organized way, would a self-driving car make dangerous decisions in the real world? That risk seems reasonable, and considering that AI models are increasingly more capable in abstract reasoning and even overcoming captchasan attack by AI bots that did something like this poses a threat worrying. The invisible CAPTCHA. Google itself knows that visual CAPTCHAs are no longer so insurmountable for machines, so it has been moving its systems towards reCAPTCHA v3a invisible system that does not require you to look for buses, zebra crossings or fire hydrants that you will never see on a street in Malaga or Bilbao. Instead, this system opaquely analyzes your behavior in front of the PC: how you move the mouse, what cookies you have installed and how you navigate. Or what is the same: Google thinks it knows how a human behaves when you’re going to click on “I’m not a robot”… when we’ve been working like robots for years and solving those puzzles. a brilliant idea. What is clear is that CAPTCHA has been a brilliant idea with implications that not even Google could have anticipated. In fact, it has turned this tool into a way to feed its artificial intelligence systems with our help, without us practically knowing (or caring much). But you know: the next time a website asks you to identify fire hydrants before entering it, remember that you are not demonstrating your humanity. You’re signing on to the afternoon shift at one of the largest data factories on the planet. In Xataka | The US blocked its most advanced chips from China to stop its AI. The result: China makes tokens cheaper than anyone else

A robot rental industry has been created in China that has plunged prices in a year, but it has an asterisk

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From spring 2025 to winter 2026, renting a humanoid robot for a business event in China has gone from costing between 10,000 and 20,000 yuan a day to being listed at 1,796. Robot dogs already cost 78 yuan a day in JD.comless than 10 euros. A drop of 80% in twelve months. Why is it important. Beyond the price war, this is the first real scale laboratory in the humanoid robot business, and what happens says a lot about the real state of an industry that moves a lot of money in financing but still needs a human behind each machine. In figures: Between the lines. The most interesting number in this matter is not any of the above, but this: every robot deployed today arrives with a human engineer behind it. This technician assumes transportation, calibration, live operation and unforeseen events. The actual model is not ‘Robot as a Servicebut rather ‘Robot + Person as a Service’. The logic of SaaS (marginal costs that approach zero when scaling) does not apply here. Each new unit in the catalog implies a new payroll. The bottleneck is therefore not in the supply of machines, but in the supply of people capable of operating them. The context. Qingtianzu, the platform controlled by Zhiyuan Robotics and backed by Hillhouse Capital, connects more than 200 suppliers with companies that need robots for presentations, inaugurations or weddings. like a marketplace. During the Chinese New Year, their orders grew by 70% and exceeded 5,000 orders in one week. JD.com saw searches for “robot” increase 25-fold. The demand exists, the problem is the cost structure. Yes, but. Rent has fallen by 80%, but operating costs have barely budged: transportation, engineers, insurance, logistics… Everything remains basically the same.. The payback period cited by operators (about six or eight months) assumes about ten monthly orders at 2,500 yuan on average. But that works during peak demand. Outside of the holiday weeks, that rhythm is broken. The big question. 65% of orders are for entertainment and marketing: robots that dance or parade at fairs and those types of cute but short-lived acts. Intermittent uses by definition. To have a stable base, the sector needs to enter factories, hospitals and logistics. But experts have already warned: the majority of current humanoids are in the “cerebellum” phase, executing instructions without autonomous decision. That jump, according to the most optimistic estimatesit will take about five years. The panoramic. In a matter of months, China has built an industry with funded platforms, distributed logistics and real demand. It is the first country that has brought humanoid robots to the mass market, even if it is to perform in shopping centers and shake hands in dealerships. TrendForce foresees more than 50,000 units shipped in 2026, 700% more. The sector has its own precedent: drones for shows, which did not take off for their industrial uses but for the shows nightlife in cities across China. Robot rental can follow the same script. The difference is that an autonomous drone no longer needs a pilot. The humanoid robot still does. In Xataka | There is a Chinese startup creating the most amazing robots of the moment. It’s called X Square Featured image | Andy Kelly

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