Toy Robot Research Articles

Playing with active matter

In the past 20 years, active matter has been a very successful research field, bridging the fundamental physics of nonequilibrium thermodynamics with applications in robotics, biology, and medicine. Active particles, contrary to Brownian particles, can harness energy to generate complex motions and emerging behaviors. Most active-matter experiments are performed with microscopic particles and require advanced microfabrication and microscopy techniques. Here, we propose some macroscopic experiments with active matter employing commercially available toy robots (the Hexbugs). We show how they can be easily modified to perform regular and chiral active Brownian motion and demonstrate through experiments fundamental signatures of active systems such as how energy and momentum are harvested from an active bath, how obstacles can sort active particles by chirality, and how active fluctuations induce attraction between planar objects (a Casimir-like effect). These demonstrations enable hands-on experimentation with active matter and showcase widely used analysis methods.

Toy Robots Mimic Swimming Algae

Toy Robots Mimic Swimming Algae

MINDBOT: DESIGN AND IMPLEMENTATION OF A MIND-CONTROLLED EDUCATIONAL ROBOT TOY FOR DISABLED CHILDREN

The mindBot robot is a new educational robot toy that can be controlled by brain signals and voice commands. It was evaluated with children with disabilities as well as healthy children as the potential users. The most significant challenge was the size of the used Emotiv Insight electroencephalogram headset when adjusting it on the children’s’ heads. Despite all the challenges, the mindBot robot is a promising technology that could be fun and educational for disabled children. The 11 participants took 36 minutes to finish all tasks on average. This includes the time they spent setting up the robot for the first time, putting on the headset, learning how to use the robot, and using the main educational features. The System Usability Scale usability score for the robot is 71.13, which is considered to be the score of good. The future stages of improving the mindBot includes adding more mobility capabilities and adding the feature of educational assessment.

Sustainable ultra-long cycle life aqueous Zn-I2 battery without ion-selective membrane

Rechargeable aqueous zinc-iodine (Zn-I2) batteries are generally in the form of redox flow battery that uses an ion-selective membrane to separate two different electrolytes. The reversible redox reactions of iodine species in the electrolyte play a key role in charge and discharge. If without the ion-selective membrane, the Zn anode would suffer from severe corrosion, and the interaction between Zn and I3– in the cycling process gradually reduces the cell capacity, Coulombic efficiency, and cycle life. Here, a simple and scalable chemical bath deposition method is developed to form an amorphous Se overlayer on the Zn foil, thus remarkably improving its anode performance in aqueous Zn-I2 battery and ruling out the use of ion-selective membrane. Effects of Se deposition time on the anti-corrosion performance, rate performance, capacity, and cycle life are investigated in detail. As a result, the button-type full cell using optimized Zn@Se anode delivers high Coulombic efficiency of 99.4%, high specific capacity of 180 mAh g–1, and ultra-long lifespan over 50,000 cycles with a capacity retention of 82.6%. Pouch type cells are made to demonstrate the efficient suppression of hydrogen gas evolution. To manifest the potential for practical applications, high-capacity cells using plastic boxes are made to drive an electric fan and a robot toy. Mechanism of this amorphous Se overlayer on Zn anode in enhancing the battery performance is discussed.

A Study Regarding Early Teacher'S Perception Toward the Introduction of Artificial Intelligence Applications and the Use of Educational Robots in the Teaching Process

Over the years Artificial Intelligence (AI) has revolutionised not only industries but also education worldwide. With the 2020 pandemic, teachers around the world have had to reconfigure their teaching process, so AI products are becoming more and more prevalent in early childhood settings to enhance the learning and development of pre-schoolers. Although robotic toys (Bee-Bot, Robot Mouse, Robotbloq Qobo, Ozobot) have been used for several years as modern teaching tools, teachers in Romania face some difficulties in integrating them into the teaching process, either because of lack of adequate training in handling these tools or because of the infrastructure needed for this purpose. The use of robotic toys in kindergarten activities is a matter of teachers' perceptions, so they decide on the use of robotic toys in the teaching process and the types of activities that would allow their use for teaching purposes. In our study, we aimed to measure teachers' perceptions of children's use of robotic toys and their incidence of using them appropriately, in the teaching process, integrated into Experiential Domain Activities. In this way, we will be able to make correlations between the use of these tools and teachers' perceptions, highlighting the benefits they bring to the teaching process and consequently to the development of children in early education.

Quantifying interaction with robotic toys in pre-term and full-term infants.

Infants born pre-term are at an increased risk for developmental, behavioral, and motor delay and subsequent disability. When these problems are detected early, clinical intervention can be effective at improving functional outcomes. Current methods of early clinical assessment are resource intensive, require extensive training, and do not always capture infants' behavior in natural play environments. We developed the Play and Neuro Development Assessment (PANDA) Gym, an affordable, mechatronic, sensor-based play environment that can be used outside clinical settings to capture infant visual and motor behavior. Using a set of classification codes developed from the literature, we analyzed videos from 24 pre-term and full-term infants as they played with each of three robotic toys designed to elicit different types of interactions-a lion, an orangutan, and an elephant. We manually coded for frequency and duration of toy interactions such as kicking, grasping, touching, and gazing. Pre-term infants gazed at the toys with similar frequency as full-term infants, but infants born full-term physically engaged more frequently and for longer durations with the robotic toys than infants born pre-term. While we showed we could detect differences between full-term and pre-term infants, further work is needed to determine whether differences seen were primarily due to age, developmental delays, or a combination.

Role of Endoscopic Procedure in Foreign Body (Button Battery) Ingestion in Children: A Case Report

Abstract: Foreign body (FB) ingestion is a common problem especially in children below the age of 5 years. Due to the extensive use of batteries as power supply in electronic gadgets, cases of button battery ingestion have become more common. If a button battery was found in the stomach of a child under the age of five, it should be assessed for esophageal injury and removed endoscopically, if at all possible, within 24 to 48 hours. We reported a 3-year-old boy who swallowed a foreign body three hours before being admitted to the hospital. Initially the patient was playing with robot toys that used batteries, then a battery of the robots was accidently swallowed. The patient had no symptoms and physical examinations showed no abnormalities. Abdominal X-ray examination revealed a foreign body located in the stomach. The patient underwent endoscopic foreign body removal but no foreign body was found until the second part of duodenum. Therefore, an exploratory laparotomy was performed, and the foreign body, a button battery, was removed from the ileum. In conclusion, since endoscopic foreign body removal failed to remove the foreign body in this patient, an exploratory laparotomy was performed and through antimesenterial ileotomy, the foreign body, a button battery, was successfully removed. Keywords: foreign body; endoscopic foreign body removal; exploratory laparotomy

The Hierarchical Newton’s Method for Numerically Stable Prioritized Dynamic Control

This work links optimization approaches from hierarchical least-squares programming to instantaneous prioritized whole-body robot control. Concretely, we formulate the hierarchical Newton’s method which solves prioritized nonlinear least-squares problems in a numerically stable fashion even in the presence of kinematic and algorithmic singularities of the approximated kinematic constraints. These results are then transferred to control problems which exhibit the additional variability of time. This is necessary to formulate acceleration-based controllers and to incorporate the second-order dynamics. However, we show that the Newton’s method without complicated adaptations is not appropriate in the acceleration domain. We therefore formulate a velocity-based controller which exhibits second-order proportional derivative (PD) convergence characteristics. Our developments are verified in toy robot control scenarios as well as in complex robot experiments which stress the importance of prioritized control and its singularity resolution.

Children’s Digital and Non-Digital Play Practices with Cozmo, the Toy Robot

Children’s Digital and Non-Digital Play Practices with Cozmo, the Toy Robot

It’s All about the Toys!

It’s All about the Toys!

ICT Skills in the Deployment of 21st Century Skills: A (Cognitive) Developmental Perspective through Early Childhood

ICT technologies are an integral part of today’s digitized society. Therefore, it is important that children acquire ICT skills as part of 21st century skills education to prepare them for later life. Drawing on the literature, seven 21st century skills can profit from the addition of ICT skills, i.e., technical, information, communication, collaboration, critical thinking, creative, and problem-solving skills. While many efforts have been made to integrate ICT skills as part of 21st century skills education into primary and secondary school curricula, the implementation of these skills in early childhood education and care remains a challenge due to developmental concerns. This paper aims to uncover developmental antecedents for ICT 21st century skills in early childhood, mainly addressing children’s cognitive development, and propose ways to implement these skills in child-friendly ways. Drawing on the literature on developmental psychology, seven cognitive developmental antecedents were identified: inductive, deductive, abductive, causal, and scientific reasoning, executive functions, and computational thinking. Moreover, five additional developmental antecedents were identified: fine motor skills, language development, self-regulation, social-emotional development, and creativity. On the backdrop of these antecedents, ways of implementing ICT skills as part of 21st century skills education in early childhood classrooms are proposed that include digital games and learning apps, collaborative play or problem-solving activities with toy robots.

Organization of Calculations and Work with Memory in the Educational Programming Language SYNHRO

The article is devoted to a number of decisions made in the project of the educational programming language Synchro, which is being developed at the Laboratory of Information Systems of the A.P. Ershov IIS SB RAS, designed to familiarize with the basic phenomena of the interaction of processes and control of calculations over shared memory. The focus is on the functional programming paradigm. The language is aimed at schoolchildren of primary and secondary grades, as well as junior students and non-professionals. During training, the experience of operating with toy robots moving on a checkered board is used. The article is of interest to everyone who is interested in the problems of modern computer science, programming and information technology, especially the problems of parallel computing on supercomputers and distributed systems, and in general the use of multiprocessor systems.

Retracted] A Voice Recognition Sensor and Voice Control System in an Intelligent Toy Robot System

In order to make the toy robot more entertaining, interesting, and intelligent, a voice recognition sensor and voice control system in the intelligent toy robot system are proposed. The system builds an overall system architecture including a client and a server. Through the camera calibration and data transmission module of the client, it collects images and calculates the internal and external parameters of the camera and transmits the image and external parameter data to the server. With the images and external parameter data transmitted from the terminal, a background image is constructed and the camera position and angle are updated in real time to complete the fusion of virtual and real scenes. Through the motion control part of the user interaction module, hearing‐impaired children can control the movement and rotation of smart toys. The experimental results show that the system has high communication synchronization and stability and can realize high‐precision control of smart toys, and the average frame rate can reach 30.97 f/s. The beneficial effect of the system is that it has various functions, has the effect of speech recognition, and is highly interesting.

Yōkobo

As part of a multidisciplinary research and a PhD project to strengthen the connection between retired couples living at home, we imagined and designed Yōkobo. It is a robot at the crossroads of a sensitive approach and a robotic trend that bridges the gap between humans (Human-Robot-Human Interactions field). As a theoretical contribution, Yōkobo is at the intersection of various concepts: behavioral objects, robjects, weak robotics, and slow technology. Yōkobo is a trinket bowl placed in the entrance of homes. Its discreet presence expresses hospitality and celebrates small moments of everyday life, welcoming visitors and inhabitants of the house. The name comes from the contraction of “yōkoso” (welcome in Japanese) and “robot” (with French pronunciation). In addition to these functions, Yōkobo expresses the state of the home using data from connected IoT devices, combining various house parameters (such as temperature, air quality, etc.) to express the home's “mood” through its motions. Finally, Yōkobo used in tandem with house keys, can convey a trace, a message based on motion. And a trace is a memory of the partner's passage. Yōkobo is resolutely innovative and disruptive. It does not sit within the lineage of the general vision of what robots are and what they can do: it is an object intended to be unobtrusive, stemming from ambient computing, while having an ongoing subtle presence. It does not make sounds, unlike voice assistants and the trend for using voice modality interaction. It expresses its environment only through motion and light. to move away from home's companion robots and the biases they can generate through facial representation, Yōkobo has neither an anthropomorphic shape nor can talk. Yōkobo is intended to be made of natural materials such as ceramic, wood, or wool to break with the idea of plastic, disposable, and toy robots, and to improve its integration in everyday home life. as a slow technology product, understanding and integrating Yōkobo into one's life takes time and requires accepting not having a clear, repetitive, and instantaneous response to an action. Its contribution is not measured in terms of efficiency and utility; it is the sum of different experiences with the product over time that creates the object's meaning and value. Getting to know Yōkobo's expressive motions is continuous and progressive. Yōkobo is an object that is understood through perception and touches the poetic sensibility of its users. Yōkobo is a concept that puts people's relationships at the center. It does not impose itself to propose an exclusive Human-Object relationship. It reveals the presence of the other by expressing the last impermanent trace of the other's passage. It is an object of sensitive presence. This work is the result of interdisciplinary research between roboticists, designers, and ergonomists. The navigation (directions and overlay) of this pan.able demonstrates the design and engineering processes, as well as the interaction modalities.

Retracted: A Voice Recognition Sensor and Voice Control System in an Intelligent Toy Robot System

Retracted: A Voice Recognition Sensor and Voice Control System in an Intelligent Toy Robot System

Влияние традиционных и роботизированных игрушек на игру детей 3–4 лет

<p>Young children’s play needs toys, which are its object support and the main tools. Character toys are of particular importance the function of which is the substitution of a character, the embodiment of a role. New technical capabilities make it possible to create complex robotic toys capable of learning, autonomous movement, and reactions to interaction with them. However, the play potential of these toys has not been sufficiently studied. The purpose of this research is to study whether young children (3-4 years old) will play with a robot toy and whether this play will differ from playing with ordinary character toys. The work of P. Kahn et al. was used as the methodological basis of this research. The study included observing a play with two types of toys – a robotic and a stuffed dinosaur, a structured interview, and a classification of cards. The sample consisted of 30 children attending a state kindergarten. The results showed that children are significantly less likely and more monotonous to play with a robotic toy than with a traditional one. At the same time, they interact more with a robotic toy, study it more and are afraid of it as a living being. The results obtained allow us to raise the question of the category of this type of toy: they belong to robots but not to character toys.</p>

The impact of story-inspired programming on preschool children's computational thinking: A multi-group experiment

Computational thinking (CT) has received worldwide attention due to its alignment with developing 21st century skills such as creativity, problem-solving, and digital competence. With the increasing provision of programming tools such as robotic toys and tablet apps in the sector of early childhood education (ECE), many ECE researchers and practitioners tend to link CT to programming. However, children are reluctant to sustain their interests in programming activities, and may be further demotivated by debugging failures. This multi-group quasi-experimental study aimed to evaluate the effects of a story-inspired approach in bridging the gap between programming and CT for preschool children. Building on previous literature suggesting storytelling as a powerful, culturally responsive pedagogy, 5-year-old children (N=108) were involved in nine weeks of CT learning via one of the three conditions: Story-Inspired Robot Programming (SIRP), Story-Inspired Tablet Programming (SITP), and unplugged CT education. Results revealed that children who participated in the SIRP and SITP conditions showed improved CT scores, relative to unplugged CT education, even after controlling for baseline CT scores. No gender or family socioeconomic effects were found to influence the benefits of story-inspired programming interventions. These findings suggest that storytelling as a culturally responsive approach, whether using robots or tablets as a programming tool, can provide young children with more inclusive and sustainable CT learning experiences.

Observations of a child’s movement response to music and their interaction with a musical toy robot

This article describes the author’s informal observations of the development of movement response to music with the added interaction with a musical toy robot. The subject under observation was one child, from the age of 8 to 24 months. Overall, the child’s readiness to move seemed to be motivated by the presence of the interactive toy robot. Observation revealed a variety of movement responses at a very young age, also in attempts to interact with the toy. The child appeared to form an emotional relationship with the toy robot that can be described by different phases from partnership with the toy, to the reduction of the toy’s role, to a passive music box. The toy robot was also used in a mediator role between siblings of different ages. Thus, interactive musical toy robots may have a beneficial effect on a child’s musical development as they provide a repetitive, safe and critique-free space. The human-like features of the toy robot (i.e. happy face, moving arms and legs) seemed to catch this child’s attention, allowing him to interact with the toy similarly to a human dance partner. The robot’s clumsy moves fit the concept of motionese, supporting the development of the child’s motor skills.

Smartphone Control Mobile Robot for Education and Research

In this digital age there is a growing interest in robotics by students in basically all age grades beginning from the toy robot cars used by preschoolers, to hi-tech robots used by teenagers and youths such as Sphero BOLT, Grillbot, and many others available in the market. In other to spark interest of youngsters in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) fields and also for robotics enthusiasts without making learning complex but simple and intuitive this cost-effective mobile robot called IKPEZE Robot was designed and developed. This can be used for education and research purposes in laboratories; knowledge gathered from this approach can also be applied to wider ranges of robotics. IKPEZE Robots has an added vision and audio capability, which provides surveillance of its immediate environment. Our main goal was to develop a low-cost mobile robot, which is cheaper than most commercial robots sold today and can find application not only in education and research, but also in other applications. This mobile robot was developed by designing and implementing a chassis having a Raspberry Pi controller programmed in C language in a Debian Linux-based OS that was used to control the chassis remotely via a Wi-Fi network. A mobile application was loaded into an Android smartphone with an easy-to-use graphical user Interface (GUI). Captured footages are sent wirelessly via Wi-Fi to the Android smartphone and it is stored in the local memory of the smartphone.

When a Robot Comes to Life

Conceptualizing agency is a long-standing theoretical concern. Taking an ethnomethodological and conversation analytic perspective, we explore agency as the oriented to capacity to produce situationally and sequentially relevant action. Drawing on video recordings of families interacting with the Cozmo toy robot, we present a multimodal analysis of a single episode featuring a variety of rapidly interchanging forms of robotic (non-)agency. We demonstrate how agency is ongoingly constituted in situated interaction between humans and a robot. Describing different ways in which the robot’s statuses as either an agent or an object are interactionally embodied into being, we distinguish “autonomous” agency, hybrid agency, ascribed agency, potential agency and non-agency.