So, robots. Robots can be programmed to do the same task millions of times with minimal error, something very difficult for us, right? And it can be very impressive to watch them at work. Look at them. I could watch them for hours. No? What is less impressive is that if you take these robots out of the factories, where the environments are not perfectly known and measured like here, to do even a simple task which doesn't require much precision, this is what can happen. I mean, opening a door, you don't require much precision.
Roboti, dakle. Roboti mogu biti programirani tako da obavljaju jedan zadatak milion puta uz minimalne greške, a nama je to vrlo teško, zar ne? I vrlo je impresivno gledati robote na delu. Vidite ih samo. Mogla bih da ih posmatram satima. Vi ne? Ono manje impresivno je to da ako ove robote iznesete van fabrika, gde okruženje nije tako poznato i kontrolisano poput ovog, i date im jednostavan zadatak koji ne zahteva preciznost ovo se može dogoditi. Otvaranje vrata, mislim, koliko morate da budete precizni.
(Laughter)
(Smeh)
Or a small error in the measurements, he misses the valve, and that's it --
Ili usled manje greške u merenju, nije uspeo da dohvati ventil, i eto -
(Laughter)
(Smeh)
with no way of recovering, most of the time.
obično ode u zaborav.
So why is that? Well, for many years, robots have been designed to emphasize speed and precision, and this translates into a very specific architecture. If you take a robot arm, it's a very well-defined set of rigid links and motors, what we call actuators, they move the links about the joints. In this robotic structure, you have to perfectly measure your environment, so what is around, and you have to perfectly program every movement of the robot joints, because a small error can generate a very large fault, so you can damage something or you can get your robot damaged if something is harder.
Ali zašto je to tako? Već mnogo godina roboti se dizajniraju tako da naglase brzinu i preciznost, a to podrazumeva vrlo specifičnu arhitekturu. Uzmimo za primer ruku robota koja predstavlja vrlo dobro definisan set krutih karika i motora, koje se nazivaju pokretači, i koji pomeraju karike između zglobova. U ovakvoj strukturi morate precizno da odredite okruženje, dakle, šta se nalazi oko njega, i morate da detaljno isprogramirate svaki pokret zglobova robota jer i najmanja greška može da dovede do ogromne greške, možete da oštetite nešto ili oštetite robota samog ako je sklop previše tvrd.
So let's talk about them a moment. And don't think about the brains of these robots or how carefully we program them, but rather look at their bodies. There is obviously something wrong with it, because what makes a robot precise and strong also makes them ridiculously dangerous and ineffective in the real world, because their body cannot deform or better adjust to the interaction with the real world. So think about the opposite approach, being softer than anything else around you. Well, maybe you think that you're not really able to do anything if you're soft, probably. Well, nature teaches us the opposite. For example, at the bottom of the ocean, under thousands of pounds of hydrostatic pressure, a completely soft animal can move and interact with a much stiffer object than him. He walks by carrying around this coconut shell thanks to the flexibility of his tentacles, which serve as both his feet and hands. And apparently, an octopus can also open a jar. It's pretty impressive, right?
Zato hajde da se pozabavimo time. I nemojte da obraćate pažnju na mozak robota ili na to kako su isprogramirani, već na njihova tela. Očigledno da nešto nije kako treba jer ono po čemu je robot precizan i snažan takođe utiče i na stepen opasnosti i efikasnosti u stvarnom svetu, jer se njihova tela ne mogu deformisati ili bolje prilagoditi interakciji sa stvarnim svetom. Hajde onda da razmislimo o suprotnom pristupu, o većem stepenu mekoće od bilo čega oko nas. Verovatno mislite da ništa ne možete da postignete ako ste previše meki, zar ne. Međutim, priroda nas uči drugačije. Primera radi, na dnu okeana, ispod hiljada paskala hidrostatičkog pritiska, jedna vrlo meka životinja se kreće i interaguje sa objektima koji su daleko tvrđi od nje. Ona hoda noseći ovu ljusku kokosa zahvaljujući fleksibilnosti svojih pipaka, koji služe kao noge i ruke. I očigledno, hobotnica može otvoriti teglu. Prilično impresivno, zar ne?
But clearly, this is not enabled just by the brain of this animal, but also by his body, and it's a clear example, maybe the clearest example, of embodied intelligence, which is a kind of intelligence that all living organisms have. We all have that. Our body, its shape, material and structure, plays a fundamental role during a physical task, because we can conform to our environment so we can succeed in a large variety of situations without much planning or calculations ahead.
Jasno je da za ovako nešto nije potreban samo mozak životinje, već i njeno telo, a ovo je čist primer i verovatno najjasniji do sada, otelotvorene inteligencije koju poseduju sva živa bića. Svi mi to imamo. Naše telo, njegov oblik, materijal i struktura igraju fudnamentalnu ulogu tokom izvođenja nekog fizičkog zadatka jer se mi možemo prilagoditi okruženju, stoga ga možemo izvšiti sa uspehom u različitim situacijama, bez mnogo planiranja i izračunavanja unapred.
So why don't we put some of this embodied intelligence into our robotic machines, to release them from relying on excessive work on computation and sensing? Well, to do that, we can follow the strategy of nature, because with evolution, she's done a pretty good job in designing machines for environment interaction. And it's easy to notice that nature uses soft material frequently and stiff material sparingly. And this is what is done in this new field of robotics, which is called "soft robotics," in which the main objective is not to make super-precise machines, because we've already got them, but to make robots able to face unexpected situations in the real world, so able to go out there. And what makes a robot soft is first of all its compliant body, which is made of materials or structures that can undergo very large deformations, so no more rigid links, and secondly, to move them, we use what we call distributed actuation, so we have to control continuously the shape of this very deformable body, which has the effect of having a lot of links and joints, but we don't have any stiff structure at all.
Zašto onda ne bismo ubacili nešto od te otelotvorene inteligencije u naše robotske mašine kako se više ne bismo oslanjali na ekstenzivan rad koji podrazumeva izračunavanje i očitavanje? Da bismo u tome uspeli, možemo slediti strategiju prirode, jer je, tokom evolucije, uradila prilično zadivljujući posao dizajniranja mašina za interakciju sa okruženjem. I nije teško primetiti da priroda često koristi meke, a umereno tvrde materijale. I to se primenjuje u ovom novom polju robotike koje se naziva „meka robotika”, a koja za glavni cilj ima ne izradu super-preciznih mašina, jer ih već imamo, već izradu robota koji su spremni da se suoče sa neočekivanim situacijama u stvarnom svetu i mogu da izađu u taj svet. Ono zbog čega je robot mekan je upravo njegovo fleksibilno telo, izrađeno od materijala i struktura koji trpe velike deformacije, dakle nema krutih karika, i drugo, kako bismo ih pomerali, koristimo tzv. distribuirano pokretanje i samim tim neprekidno imamo kontrolu nad oblikom ovog vrlo fleksibilnog tela, što za rezultat ima mnogo karika i zglobova, ali ne i krutu strukturu.
So you can imagine that building a soft robot is a very different process than stiff robotics, where you have links, gears, screws that you must combine in a very defined way. In soft robots, you just build your actuator from scratch most of the time, but you shape your flexible material to the form that responds to a certain input. For example, here, you can just deform a structure doing a fairly complex shape if you think about doing the same with rigid links and joints, and here, what you use is just one input, such as air pressure.
Stoga vam je jasno da je izrada mekog robota vrlo drugačiji posao u odnosu na tvrdu robotiku, gde postoje karike, zupčanici, zavrtnji koje morate da kombinujete na vrlo definisan način. Kod mekih robota, obično je potrebno da samo napravite pokretač ni iz čega, ali oblikujete fleksibilan materijal na način koji odgovara zadatim parametrima. Ovde možete deformisati strukturu vrlo kompleksnog oblika, ako želite da uradite isto sa krutim karikama i zglobovima, a ovde imamo samo jedan zadati parametar, kao što je pritisak vazduha.
OK, but let's see some cool examples of soft robots. Here is a little cute guy developed at Harvard University, and he walks thanks to waves of pressure applied along its body, and thanks to the flexibility, he can also sneak under a low bridge, keep walking, and then keep walking a little bit different afterwards. And it's a very preliminary prototype, but they also built a more robust version with power on board that can actually be sent out in the world and face real-world interactions like a car passing it over it ... and keep working.
U redu, hajde da vidimo neke kul meke robote. Ovo je mališa kog su razvili na univerzitetu Harvard, a koji se kreće zahvaljujući talasima pritiska duž njegovog tela, i zahvaljujući toj fleksibilnosti, robot može da se kreće ispod niskog mosta, nastavi da hoda, a zatim nastavi kretanje malo drugačije nakon toga. I ovo je tek preliminarni prototip, ali se takođe radi na robusnijoj verziji sa pokretačkom snagom koja može da se primeni i interaguje sa stvarnim svetom, na primer, sa automobilom koji prolazi pored ili preko njega... i nastavi sa radom.
It's cute.
Simpatično je.
(Laughter)
(Smeh)
Or a robotic fish, which swims like a real fish does in water simply because it has a soft tail with distributed actuation using still air pressure. That was from MIT, and of course, we have a robotic octopus. This was actually one of the first projects developed in this new field of soft robots. Here, you see the artificial tentacle, but they actually built an entire machine with several tentacles they could just throw in the water, and you see that it can kind of go around and do submarine exploration in a different way than rigid robots would do. But this is very important for delicate environments, such as coral reefs.
Ili riba robot koja pliva poput prave ribe u vodi samo zato što ima mek rep sa distribuiranim pokretanjem koji koristi pritisak vazduha u mirovanju. To je odradio MIT i, naravno, imamo hobotnicu robota. Ovo je, zapravo, jedan od prvih projekata razvijenih u ovom novom polju meke robotike. Ovde vidimo veštački pipak, ali je dizajnirana čitava mašina sa nekoliko pipaka koju možete baciti u vodu, i vidite kako može da kruži okolo i istražuje podvodni svet na drugačiji način od krutih robota. Ovo je vrlo važno za delikatna okruženja poput koralnih grebena.
Let's go back to the ground. Here, you see the view from a growing robot developed by my colleagues in Stanford. You see the camera fixed on top. And this robot is particular, because using air pressure, it grows from the tip, while the rest of the body stays in firm contact with the environment. And this is inspired by plants, not animals, which grows via the material in a similar manner so it can face a pretty large variety of situations.
Vratimo se na zemlju. Ovde imamo prikaz iz ugla rastućeg robota kog su razvile moje kolege sa Stanforda. Na vrhu se nalazi kamera. I ovaj robot, budući da koristi pritisak vazduha, raste sa vrha, dok drugi deo tela ostaje u kontaktu sa okruženjem. Inspiracija za poduhvat dolazi od biljaka, ne životinja, koje rastu putem materijala na sličan način, stoga se može prilagoditi raznim situacijama.
But I'm a biomedical engineer, and perhaps the application I like the most is in the medical field, and it's very difficult to imagine a closer interaction with the human body than actually going inside the body, for example, to perform a minimally invasive procedure. And here, robots can be very helpful with the surgeon, because they must enter the body using small holes and straight instruments, and these instruments must interact with very delicate structures in a very uncertain environment, and this must be done safely. Also bringing the camera inside the body, so bringing the eyes of the surgeon inside the surgical field can be very challenging if you use a rigid stick, like a classic endoscope.
S obzirom na to da sam biomedicinski inženjer, pa primenu koju najviše volim nalazim u polju medicine, i vrlo je teško zamisliti bližu interakciju sa ljudskim telom od zalaženja u telo samo, na primer, u cilju izvođenja minimalno invazivne procedure. Ovi roboti mogu biti od velike pomoći hirurgu, jer moraju da uđu u telo pomoću malih rupa i pravih instrumenata, a ovi instrumenti moraju interagovati sa vrlo delikatnim strukturama u vrlo neodređenom okruženju, i vodeći računa o bezbednosti. Pored toga, uvođenje kamere u telo, kako bi hirurg imao uvid u oblast koju operiše, može predstavljati izazov ukoliko se koristi krut štap, poput klasičnog endoskopa.
With my previous research group in Europe, we developed this soft camera robot for surgery, which is very different from a classic endoscope, which can move thanks to the flexibility of the module that can bend in every direction and also elongate. And this was actually used by surgeons to see what they were doing with other instruments from different points of view, without caring that much about what was touched around. And here you see the soft robot in action, and it just goes inside. This is a body simulator, not a real human body. It goes around. You have a light, because usually, you don't have too many lights inside your body.
Zajedno sa istraživačkom grupom u Evropi razvili smo ovog mekog robota za operaciju, koji se umnogome razlikuje od klasičnog endoskopa, i koji može da se pomera zahvaljujući fleksibilnom modulu koji se savija u svim pravcima, a takođe se može izdužiti. Hirurzi jesu zapravo koristili ovaj izum kako bi videli šta rade sa drugim instrumentima sa drugačijim uglom gledanja, ne mareći za to šta se dodiruje usput. Ovde možete videti mekog robota na delu, koji samo uđe unutra. Ovo je simulacija tela, ne pravo ljudsko telo. Ide u krug. Postoji i svetlo jer, obično, delovi vašeg tela nisu osvetljeni.
We hope.
Nadamo se.
(Laughter)
(Smeh)
But sometimes, a surgical procedure can even be done using a single needle, and in Stanford now, we are working on a very flexible needle, kind of a very tiny soft robot which is mechanically designed to use the interaction with the tissues and steer around inside a solid organ. This makes it possible to reach many different targets, such as tumors, deep inside a solid organ by using one single insertion point. And you can even steer around the structure that you want to avoid on the way to the target.
Ponekad se hirurška intervencija obavi samo jednom iglom, a trenutno na Stanfordu radimo na vrlo fleksibilnoj igli, poput vrlo malog mekog robota koji je mehanički dizajniran za interakciju sa ovim tkivima i manevrisanje kroz čvrst organ. To omogućava pristup mnogim različitim tačkama poput tumora, duboko u čvrstom organu pomoću jednog uboda iglom. I time se, čak, može manevrisati unutar strukture koju želite da izbegnete na putu do željene tačke.
So clearly, this is a pretty exciting time for robotics. We have robots that have to deal with soft structures, so this poses new and very challenging questions for the robotics community, and indeed, we are just starting to learn how to control, how to put sensors on these very flexible structures. But of course, we are not even close to what nature figured out in millions of years of evolution.
Složićemo se da je ovo vrlo uzbudljivo vreme za robotiku. Imamo robote dizajnirane za meke strukture, pa se postavljaju neka nova, izazovna pitanja zajednici robotike, i zaista, tek počinjemo da učimo kako da upravljamo, stavljamo senzore na ove fleksibilne strukture. Ali naravno, nismo ni blizu toga što je priroda shvatila tokom milion godina evolucije.
But one thing I know for sure: robots will be softer and safer, and they will be out there helping people. Thank you.
Ali jedno zasigurno znam: roboti će biti mekši i bezbedniji, i pomagaće ljudima. Hvala vam.
(Applause)
(Aplauz)