MIT's Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Lab (CSAIL) has released a video of their ongoing work using muscle signals to control devices. Their latest involves full and fine control of drones (无人机), using just hand and arm gestures to pilot through a series of circles.
This work is impressive not just because they're using bio-feedback to control the devices, instead of optical (光学的) or other kinds of gesture recognition, but also because of how specific the controls can be, setting up a range of different potential applications for this kind of remote tech.
This particular group of researchers has been looking at different applications for this tech, including its use in collaborative robotics (协作机器人) for potential industrial applications. Drone piloting is another area that could have big applications in terms of real- world use, especially once you start to imagine entire groups of these taking flight with a pilot provided a view of what they can see via VR. That could be a great way to do spot surveying for construction, for example, or remote equipment check of dangerous places and other construction that's hard for people to reach.
The development of drones is just part of the team's work. Smooth robot and human interaction is the ultimate goal of the team working on this tech. Researchers believe the process should be as easy when controlling and working with robots. They say thinking and doing are essentially happening at the same time when we communicate with our environment, but when we act through machines or remote tools, there's often something lost in translation, showing slow learning, and the requirement of lots of training. Therefore, much more work is going on.
