Your daily robotics fix.

My favorite robot vacuum just got quieter, and more expensive

Matic, the company behind my favorite robot vacuum, is launching its first new model since its 2023 debut: the Matic Serene. The new robotic floor cleaner has one key upgrade: noise reduction. With a promised output of…

ANYbotics begins delivering ANYmal X legged robot for explosive atmospheres

ANYbotics has designed the ANYmal X inspection robot to comply with the strictest safety standards of the oil, gas, and chemical industries. The post ANYbotics begins delivering ANYmal X legged robot for explosive…

Percepto Launches Hardware-Agnostic Axion Platform, Bringing Physical AI to Mission Critical Operations

Software-first strategy opens Percepto’s platform to existing drone fleets and industrial sensor systems, backed by

Luxonis OAK 4 FFC Lets Robot Builders Design Their Own Multi-Camera Vision System on One Board

Choose up to five cameras, place them wherever the machine needs them, and run depth

Embotech and BMW move 1M vehicles with automated driving technology

Embotech is automatically moving 3,500 vehicles around the clock daily across four BMW sites in the U.K. and Germany. The post Embotech and BMW move 1M vehicles with automated driving technology appeared first on The…

Xpanner launches autonomous pile driver for solar farm contruction

Xpanner's new X1 Piling R6 robot autonomously drives solar posts with one operator, improving placement accuracy while cutting on-site labor. The post Xpanner launches autonomous pile driver for solar farm contruction…

Artificial skin helps robots grasp pencil lead and pull away from needles

Researchers have covered robotic fingers with a new artificial skin that allows the hand to grasp fragile pencil lead and pull away from a needle before it punctures the covering. Both actions depend on more than…

Electronic skin instantly displays touch as light

“Your touch lights me up” sounds like quite the romantic figurative statement, doesn’t it? Well, not anymore. Researchers at the National University of Singapore (NUS) have developed an ultrathin, flexible electronic…

Intel and SAP show physical AI and the autonomous warehouse in action

Intel says that it and SAP are 'closing the loop' between enterprise workflows and autonomous robots by linking business IT and robots. The post Intel and SAP show physical AI and the autonomous warehouse in action…

DJI Modify 1.7.0 adds new ways to refine drone 3D models

DJI Modify is more than a tool for cleaning up drone-generated 3D models. It is designed to help mapping professionals turn raw reconstruction outputs into polished, usable deliverables, whether that means repairing a…

Own a DJI Flip drone? Check these settings after the latest update

If your DJI Flip has been sitting in your camera bag waiting for the next trip, there’s a small maintenance update worth installing before takeoff. DJI has released new firmware for its compact camera drone, joining a…

Autel EVO Lite 640T and 6K drones get a new update

Autel Robotics has a fresh firmware update for its EVO Lite Enterprise series, giving professionals another reason to check in on a compact drone lineup designed for work that goes well beyond aerial photography. more…

Keeping Critical Data in Canada: How ThinkOn and AVSS Are Building a Sovereign Platform for Public Safety and Defence

Council of Canadian Innovators | Conseil canadien des innovateurs (CCI) ThinkOn and AVSS have built

Origami-based construction method yields lightweight, load-bearing structures on architectural scales

The modular approach could be used to erect emergency shelters or fabricate aerospace components more quickly and with less material than some techniques.

RAIWAY: A Large-Wheeled Bipedal Robot with Contact-Informed Blind Locomotion

arXiv:2610.33172v1 Announce Type: new Abstract: We present RAIWAY, an in-house wheeled bipedal robot with 20-inch wheels, together with a contact-informed control approach for rolling locomotion across irregular and…

Bracketing Shows the Way: Adaptive Multi-Exposure Policy as Input for Robust Visual SLAM

arXiv:2610.33174v1 Announce Type: new Abstract: Rapid illumination transitions can disturb Visual SLAM (VSLAM) by saturating images before the Automatic Exposure (AE) policy adapts, removing the visual correspondences…

Interpretable Collision Avoidance and Feasibility Guarantees through an Uncertainty Aware Pipeline

arXiv:2610.33186v1 Announce Type: new Abstract: Autonomous vehicles (AVs) operating in dynamic, challenging conditions such as intersections and roundabouts must guarantee collision avoidance under uncertainty while…

Causal-based approaches to explain and learn from self-extension - A review

arXiv:2610.33227v1 Announce Type: new Abstract: The last decades have seen a revolution in autonomous robotics. Deep learning approaches and their hardware implementations have made it possible to endow robots with…

ORBIT: A Modular Multi-finger Robotic Hand Platform with Rotational Finger Reconfiguration

arXiv:2610.33241v1 Announce Type: new Abstract: Despite the popularity of multi-fingered robotic hands for dexterous manipulation, there is no systematic platform to compare different hand morphologies against one…

Neuromorphic Decision Dynamics for Deadlock-free Safe Navigation in Congested Environments

arXiv:2610.33271v1 Announce Type: new Abstract: Safe navigation in congested environments requires both collision avoidance and coordinated passage. We introduce neuromorphic decision dynamics (NDD), a decentralized…

Tiny Recursive Policy: Recursive Latent Refinement for Visuomotor Control

arXiv:2610.33288v1 Announce Type: new Abstract: Behaviour cloning has become a powerful approach for robotic manipulation, but many modern policies reconstruct their internal representation from a fixed observation…

Active Reachability Learning for Humanoid Recoverability Monitoring

arXiv:2610.33317v1 Announce Type: new Abstract: Deploying humanoid task policies requires reliable runtime monitors that anticipate unrecoverable falls in time to trigger a fallback. We formulate this task as learning…

TinyFlow: Breaking the Warping Bottleneck for Edge Optical Flow

arXiv:2610.33338v1 Announce Type: new Abstract: High-performance optical flow networks are difficult to deploy on resource-constrained edge accelerators because their iterative refinement warps features by the current…

MOTIO: Agentic Skill Engineering for Reality-Grounded Humanoid Loco-Manipulation

arXiv:2610.33446v1 Announce Type: new Abstract: We present MOTIO, an agentic skill-engineering system that turns ordinary human-action videos, reality-grounded 3D assets, motion references, and reusable robot skills…

SCET-CBF: Speed-Calibrated Soft Guidance for One-Step Dynamic Navigation

arXiv:2610.33471v1 Announce Type: new Abstract: Control barrier functions (CBFs) support collision avoidance, yet dense dynamic encounters can leave a vehicle with no feasible command. Geometric refinements and soft…

A Differentiable Chassis Safety Layer for Intelligent Vehicle Motion Control

arXiv:2610.33476v1 Announce Type: new Abstract: Learning-based vehicle motion control requires coordination between diverse task objectives and state-dependent chassis safety constraints. Conventional cascaded…

MDPO: Multi-constraint Dexterous Policy Optimization with Reinforcement Learning

arXiv:2610.33480v1 Announce Type: new Abstract: Dexterous manipulation requires high-dimensional control policies to accomplish complex contact-rich tasks while simultaneously satisfying multiple safety requirements…

Learning Dexterous Manipulation: Hands, Simulators, Training, and Evaluation

arXiv:2610.33486v1 Announce Type: new Abstract: A dexterous hand can change an object's pose without setting it down. This survey covers 113 learning-based methods that attempt it, the hands they run on, the simulators…

Omnibot Reborn: Giving a 1984 Robot Butler the Brain It Was Promised

In 1984, Tomy sold a toy robot that promised a domestic future it couldn’t quite deliver. Forty years later, a maker in Miami gave it vision, a voice, and just enough intelligence to finally pull it off. The post…

Train a Balance Bot With Reinforcement Learning

Teach a robot to balance, using reinforcement learning in simulation just like the big labs. The post Train a Balance Bot With Reinforcement Learning appeared first on Make: DIY Projects and Ideas for Makers .

Bedrock Robotics nears $1B in total funding as demand for autonomous heavy equipment surges

Bedrock Robotics has secured $600 million to scale autonomous heavy equipment and combat construction labor shortages. The post Bedrock Robotics nears $1B in total funding as demand for autonomous heavy equipment surges…

OMRON to acquire OnLogic to address edge AI applications

OMRON will add industrial computing from OnLogic to its industrial automation expertise to serve data- and AI-intensive applications. The post OMRON to acquire OnLogic to address edge AI applications appeared first on…

ICE plan to buy robot dogs spurs protest from hundreds of Boston Dynamics employees

US robotics company stands by ICE deal as more than 300 employees warn of risk.

Musk accuses Ukraine of violating Starlink terms with deadly drone strikes

Ukraine says Starshield back to normal, denies misuse of Starlink commercial service.

Remānguys from Tallinn reaches the final of Anduril’s AI Grand Prix, a world race of drones that fly themselves

A team of three from Tallinn and Prague finished 9th out of more than 3,000

Crockford’s First Law of Bureaucratic Innovation

Innovation is a curious business. It requires a particular kind of optimism, bordering on delusion,

SightFlight Turns a Single DJI Drone Flight Into a Complete Solar Roof Survey

Darien, Connecticut, October 2026 SightFlight – a drone software company serving the solar and roofing

Agility and GXO Logistics plan expanded deployment of Digit humanoid

GXO Logistics, which has tested humanoid robots from multiple companies, will deploy Agility's Digit at two more sites. The post Agility and GXO Logistics plan expanded deployment of Digit humanoid appeared first on The…

Agility Robotics expands GXO Logistics deal to deploy Digit humanoid in more facilities

GXO and Agility are building on their robotics-as-a-service agreement to bring the Digit humanoid to two more U.S. sites. The post Agility Robotics expands GXO Logistics deal to deploy Digit humanoid in more facilities…

Robots in Society, Business and Culture: September 2026

A walking robotic hand, from Fingers as Legs: Learning Self-Supported Locomotion and Manipulation with an Anthropomorphic Hand, Amirhossein Kazemipour, Hehui Zheng, Robert Katzschmann. By Emmet Cole In our monthly…

Hairy Armor For Combat Robot? It’s Not Terrible!

[Angus] of Maker’s Muse enjoys combat robotics, in which contenders zip about in an arena, attempting to disable one another with weapons that lift, spin, and smash. He got a …read more

DJI Avata 360 drone just got better at capturing cinematic shots

A drone that captures everything around it just got better at deciding where to fly next. DJI’s Avata 360 has picked up waypoint flight, zoom controls for subject tracking, and support for the RC Pro 2 controller in a…

Teradyne Robotics partners with Sereact to scale physical AI in retail and logistics

Sereact and Teradyne have already shipped hundreds of UR robots in dual-arm systems to live customer sites across Europe. The post Teradyne Robotics partners with Sereact to scale physical AI in retail and logistics…

Reprieved from the boneyard: how the US military is saving $70m by recycling its robot helicopters

Rather than leaving four multi-million-dollar Navy drones to gather dust in an Arizona boneyard, the US Army has repurposed the retired aircraft to test advanced sensors, saving taxpayers $70m in a rare victory for…

GA-ASI Partnering With Spirit Defense For FQ-42 CCA Production

General Atomics Aeronautical Systems, Inc. (GA-ASI) has received a production contract from the U.S. Air

TUM Convergence Center and TUM RoboGym powered by NEURA unite research, talent and industry to accelerate the development of AI and robotics

The renowned Technical University of Munich (TUM) has opened its new TUM Convergence Center at

From Drone Pilot to Cockpit: The Procedural Skills That Transfer (and the Ones That Don’t)

Many drone operators assume that years of flying unmanned aircraft make the jump to a

Finger-controlled robo beetle sports artificial muscles & two-way feedback

Insects have long been a source of inspiration for robotics engineers. They are small, agile, and can squeeze into spaces where people can’t. Such robots are very useful for space exploration, inspecting industrial…

DJI Avata drone owners have a new firmware update to install

The DJI Avata is built for pilots who’d rather swoop through a tight gap than capture another routine aerial shot. Now, DJI has rolled out a fresh firmware update for its FPV drone, although the release notes are light…

Subaquatic robot leverages biomimetics for natural movement

Exploring the underwater world requires robots that can move as naturally as fish and, ideally, blend in as much as possible. That’s exactly what a research group at North Carolina State University has been working on…

Wearable system captures human activity data for robot training

Humanoid robots, robotic systems with a body shape that resembles that of humans, could tackle various chores and everyday manual tasks. To successfully complete these tasks, however, the robots should be able to…

Eka Robotics raises $150M to scale its vision-force-action model for robots

Eka Robotics is building a vision-force-action, or VFA, model to develop an intuition of physics through reinforcement learning at scale. The post Eka Robotics raises $150M to scale its vision-force-action model for…

Sereact and Teradyne Robotics scale physical AI in logistics, retail

Teradyne Robotics and Sereact have already deployed hundreds of UR cobots to automate returns across Europe. The post Sereact and Teradyne Robotics scale physical AI in logistics, retail appeared first on Automated…

Four DJI FPV goggles just got firmware updates

Got a pair of DJI FPV goggles sitting in your gear bag? You might want to check for a firmware update, as DJI has released new software for four models. more…

DJI RC, RC 2, and RC Pro 2 get new firmware updates

DJI’s latest drone firmware rollout isn’t just about the aircraft themselves. The company has also released updates for three of its screen-equipped remote controllers, bringing routine bug fixes and, in one case, new…

Flexible robot arms learn to predict their next move

A robot arm that bends like an elephant's trunk can slip into tight spaces and handle fragile objects. Controlling it is harder because its smooth bending makes its next move hard to predict. Researchers have now…

Webinar to discuss how the FCC robotics ruling affects automation buyers

Industry leaders will discuss what robotics buyers should know about the recent FCC restriction on certain connected systems. The post Webinar to discuss how the FCC robotics ruling affects automation buyers appeared…

Webinar: What buyers need to know about the FCC robot ruling

Learn how the recent FCC restriction of certain foreign-made mobile robots can affect plans to acquire, deploy, and support automation. The post Webinar: What buyers need to know about the FCC robot ruling appeared…

Generative Bionics to launch Physical AI Data Factory in Italy

Generative Bionics says it hopes to advance European robotics sovereignty by ensuring that humanoid data is are generated on the continent. The post Generative Bionics to launch Physical AI Data Factory in Italy…

Video Friday: Quadruped Robot Solves Giant Rubik’s Cube by Itself

Video Friday is your weekly selection of awesome robotics videos, collected by your friends at IEEE Spectrum robotics. We also post a weekly calendar of upcoming robotics events for the next few months. Please send us…

Kardex provides scalable AutoStore fulfillment systems to Canada

Kardex has expanded its AutoStore business in Canada, providing intralogistics support through its team and a growing network of partners. The post Kardex provides scalable AutoStore fulfillment systems to Canada…

Robot Talk Episode 167 – Automating construction, with Jan Petrš

Claire chatted to Jan Petrš from École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL) and Déploya Robotics about novel robot designs for construction and architecture. Jan Petrš is a roboticist, architect, and entrepreneur…

DJI Neo and Neo 2 drones get new firmware, but what’s changed?

DJI has rolled out new firmware updates for its Neo and Neo 2 camera drones, giving owners of both palm-sized flyers another reason to check their DJI Fly app. more…

DJI updates Mini 5 Pro, Air 3S, and Mavic 4 Pro with new firmware

DJI is rolling out new firmware for some of its most capable consumer camera drones, giving Mini 5 Pro , Air 3S , and Mavic 4 Pro owners another reason to check their DJI Fly apps. more…

Lab-grown mouse muscles enable tiny robots to jump, swim, walk and grasp

Lab-grown skeletal muscle tissue can contract, but the movement is often so slight that it is barely visible. This poses a problem for biohybrid robots designed to move using living muscles. Researchers at ETH Zurich…

Former OpenAI science lead launches Warp Science to automate wet labs with robots

Wearing cameras and sensor gloves, the startup’s human chemists will train robots to perform various lab tasks.

Lucas Systems partners with CMU to advance algorithmic logistics planning

Lucas Systems and CMU are researching new ways to use data to help operators manage distribution centers more efficiently. The post Lucas Systems partners with CMU to advance algorithmic logistics planning appeared…

Dream Labs raises $90M and launches Dream API

Dream Labs says its Dream-1 AI model works across robots from different manufacturers and will allow robots to transfer their learning. The post Dream Labs raises $90M and launches Dream API appeared first on The Robot…

DJI updates two classic drones after years of firmware silence

DJI’s Mavic Air 2 and Air 2S may be several years old, but the company hasn’t forgotten about them. Both camera drones have received new firmware updates, marking a return to software maintenance after the Mavic Air 2…

Remember Mini 2? DJI certainly does

Remember the DJI Mini 2 ? The little drone that made 4K aerial footage accessible to just about everyone has suddenly received some attention from DJI again, and if you’ve owned one, this is a pretty good excuse to feel…

DJI revives the Mini 3 Pro with a surprise firmware update

DJI appears to have a small surprise for Mini 3 Pro owners. The company has released a new firmware update for the compact drone, marking its first firmware refresh in more than two years. more…

Tesla starts Optimus robot production in California as profit falls 43%

Tesla's revenue was flat and its expenses skyrocketed as it pressed the accelerator on its Optimus robots, AI, and autonomous driving.

Wheeled, flying and six-legged robots stay on track with new learning method

It's important for a robot not just to learn a task optimally, but to complete it without going off the rails of reasonable expectations. Until now, roboticists could have one or the other. Aerospace engineering…

AGCO to deploy Agility Digit humanoid in Kansas factory

The Agility pilot, which is expected to begin in 2027, will begin at an AGCO production facility for agricultural equipment. The post AGCO to deploy Agility Digit humanoid in Kansas factory appeared first on The Robot…

A guide to Day 2 of RoboBusiness 2026

Day 2 of RoboBusiness 2026, the 20th anniversary of the event, will include interesting keynotes around humanoids and social robots. The post A guide to Day 2 of RoboBusiness 2026 appeared first on The Robot Report .

Stord secures $400M to scale fulfillment network and physical AI lab

Oversubscribed at nearly double its original target, the financing will allow the company to expand Stord Labs for physical AI. The post Stord secures $400M to scale fulfillment network and physical AI lab appeared…

Matternet drones take on London traffic to speed up children’s care

London traffic can be more than a daily frustration when doctors are waiting on urgent test results. For children receiving care at Great Ormond Street Hospital (GOSH), getting medical samples to a laboratory faster…

From dirt volumes to camera blind spots, SkyeBrowse adds new tools

Drone mapping teams can now compare 10 site surveys, calculate cut-and-fill volumes, check accuracy against ground control points, and plan security camera placement directly in SkyeBrowse. more…

Secret trigger words could make AI-powered robots dangerous

Large language models (LLMs) like OpenAI's ChatGPT, Anthropic's Claude and Google Gemini are increasingly being used to help robots perform tasks, but what if LLMs could be exploited to turn helpful robots into harmful…

Reservoir launches new agricultural robotics incubator for Washington growers

Reservoir hopes to put agricultural robotics startups to work in the orchards, vineyards and berry fields alongside researchers and growers. The post Reservoir launches new agricultural robotics incubator for Washington…

Ex-Nvidia-turned-VC Amulya Vishwanath: ‘Physical AI is in its LEGO era’

It’s the moment everyone is waiting for — the ChatGPT moment for robotics, Amulya Vishwanath explained to TechCrunch’s Equity.

Eka is worth $1.45B thanks to a physical AI model that has experts raving

Eka Robotics may be the first robotic arm that is actually good at picking up a wide range of objects, and it is so smooth and human-like, it is wowing the industry.

Vention launches 24/7 video-based remote support

Building on the Remote Support service it introduced in 2023, Vention now connects manufacturers with automation experts on every shift. The post Vention launches 24/7 video-based remote support appeared first on…

Locus Robotics finds Gen Z shoppers are four times more likely than boomers to plan to return purchases

'Bracketing' among younger apparel shoppers is one of several generational buying habits leading to more returns, found Locus. The post Locus Robotics finds Gen Z shoppers are four times more likely than boomers to plan…

ACM SIGAI Autonomous Agents Award 2027 open for nominations

Nominations are solicited for the 2027 ACM SIGAI Autonomous Agents Research Award. This award is made for excellence in research in the area of autonomous agents. It is intended to recognize researchers in autonomous…

MIT spinout makes surgical stitching more like applying a sticky note

SanaHeal has developed a biologically compatible adhesive that sticks to wet tissues to simplify a variety of surgeries.

From wombat burrows to Noah's Ark: Robot joins search

Technology developed by an Australian engineer to explore wombat burrows has been sent to eastern Türkiye to join in the search for the biblical Noah's Ark.

Robot AI predicts future scenes to guide its next moves

A robot artificial intelligence (AI) system has been developed that can understand human instructions, predict what a scene will look like after an action and then carry out the task. Rather than simply translating…

beRobox unveils PALTZ palletizer with 3D Dynamic Safety at PACK EXPO 2026

The new module combines Sonair's ultrasonic tech with beRobox engineering to give robot arms dynamic detection for safe, fast palletizing. The post beRobox unveils PALTZ palletizer with 3D Dynamic Safety at PACK EXPO…

The Robot I Didn’t Expect to Build

Agility Robotics , the company I cofounded out of my robotics lab at Oregon State University in 2015, has just launched Digit 5 . It’s designed to be the first humanoid robot that can safely and economically do useful…

Laplace Intelligence red-teams robots and self-driving cars before they hit the real world

University of Michigan spinout Laplace Intelligence uses AI agents and interactive simulation to stress-test robots and self-driving vehicles before deployment. The profitable startup is competing in Startup Battlefield…

Powered by muscle cells, a paper-thin robot swims through watery maze

MIT engineers’ new aquabot offers a way to design small, efficient “biohybrid” robots.

Bioinspired robot airdrops into remote waters via morphing wing-sail

“Fall like a maple seed, sail like a boat” sounds like advice from legendary heavyweight boxer Muhammad Ali. In reality, it describes a new robotic platform scientists have created for fast, long-term deployment to…

Team develops embodied robotic arm 'EmArm' with human-like touch sensing

A research team at The Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (HKUST) has developed an Embodied Sensorimotor Robotic Arm (EmArm) capable of whole-arm tactile sensing and adaptive manipulation. By embedding a…

Wound-helix robot leaps and bounds over obstacles

Remember that “dancing pencils” game schoolchildren played, where they passed two pencils through a small rubber band, twisted them repeatedly, and then let go to make the pencils jump around as the band unraveled?…

Video Friday: When Two Robots Become One

Video Friday is your weekly selection of awesome robotics videos, collected by your friends at IEEE Spectrum robotics. We also post a weekly calendar of upcoming robotics events for the next few months. Please send us…

An Nvidia insider-turned-VC on why robotics hasn’t hit its ChatGPT moment, yet

Amulya Vishwanath, who spent seven years leading product marketing for NVIDIA’s robotics platforms, says robotics is currently in its “Lego era,” with the basic building blocks like actuators, robotic hands, software…

Physical AI is more than robots, says the Nvidia veteran now investing in it

Amulya Vishwanath, who spent seven years leading product marketing for NVIDIA’s robotics platforms, says robotics is currently in its “Lego era,” with the basic building blocks like actuators, robotic hands, software…

Robot Talk Episode 166 – Evolving robot bodies and brains, with Rika Antonova

Claire chatted to Rika Antonova from the University of Cambridge about using artificial intelligence to develop complimentary robot hardware and algorithms. Rika Antonova is an Associate Professor at the University of…

Cleaning a giant ship: Roomba-like robots walk on magnetic feet to scrub giant ships

Timothy Wong didn't suspect it at the time, but his dives off the coast of Rockport and the hours he spent studying the wheels and gears of robotics were leading to one mission: figuring out a way to get unwanted sea…

TechCrunch Disrupt 2026: Last day

Last day to be part of TechCrunch Disrupt 2026. Join 10,000+ tech leaders for a day of connections and insights. Save 75% on your pass now.

AI drone outpaces former world champions using one camera and no GPS

What does it take for an autonomous robot to be faster around a course than human drone pilots? At these dizzying speeds, humans need lightning-fast reflexes. Researchers at Delft University of Technology (the…

Save 50% on your TechCrunch Disrupt 2026 ticket and join the last 2 days in San Francisco’s Moscone West

Get a 50% discount on the last two days of TechCrunch Disrupt 2026, October 14-15, in San Francisco. Register now and join the rest of the startup ecosystem. Today, it's all about physical and software AI.

TechCrunch Disrupt 2026: Day 2

Day 2 at TechCrunch Disrupt 2026, full of all themes across AI, as well as an investor-only session, more roundtables, Side Events, and more. Register to save 50% on your pass.

Can you trust a robot in charge?

From monitoring public spaces to responding to requests for help, security robots are beginning to take on roles once held by people. As they gain authority, researchers are asking what it might take for the public to…

Neurosymbolic planning using natural language communication for cooperative autonomous vehicles

Imagine you are driving toward an intersection. A truck parked on the corner blocks your view of a car speeding toward the intersection from the right. You can’t see it, but the car next to you can. What if that…

Industrial Next wants factory robots to switch tasks in minutes, not weeks

Industrial Next helps manufacturers automate complex, delicate tasks that have traditionally required human labor.

Soft robotic fish combines high-speed swimming with 3D maneuverability

Researchers from the Shenyang Institute of Automation (SIA) of the Chinese Academy of Sciences have developed an electrohydraulically actuated soft robotic fish that can swim at high speeds and perform agile…

Rivian’s startup Mind Robotics hires former Ford EV chief Doug Field

Field also worked on Apple's secretive car project and oversaw development of the Tesla Model 3.

Q&A: Mars Perseverance Rover Sets a Distance Record

On 11 October , the Perseverance rover completed a drive that brought its total distance traveled on Mars to 28.10 miles (45.22 kilometers). This is a new record for Mars rovers, enabled in large part by Perseverance ’s…

Beetle-inspired soft robot follows finger commands to walk, grip and relay sensory information

Researchers have developed a technology that lets a user move a small robot by bending and straightening a finger. The user can also pick up and move objects while checking the images and contact information that the…

TechCrunch Disrupt 2026: Day 1

TechCrunch Disrupt 2026 officially kicks off today. See what's in store for Day 1 (Oct. 13) at San Francisco's Moscone West. Don't miss it. Register for your pass now and meet 10,000+ tech leaders at the startup…

Biped bot uses your old, dusty phone for brains

That old phone gathering dust in a drawer could have a second life far more entertaining than being a paperweight. UCLA researchers have created PhoneBot, a little humanoid that puts your smartphone to work as the…

The Hexa-Bouncer May Be The Most Overengineered Thing You See This Week

Sometimes, you want to build a simple project– the minimum viable product that solves your problem and nothing else. Other times you might be feeling a little extra, and want …read more

Humanoid robots can sprint and box – but the real test is doing the laundry

By Wai-keung Fung, Cardiff Metropolitan University At the recent World Humanoid Robot Games 2026 in Beijing, robots sprinted, boxed, played football and tackled tasks inspired by factories, restaurants and emergency…

Water-pumping robot worms its way over rugged coastal terrain

Biomimicry involves borrowing ideas from nature to solve engineering problems. This is what one of the research teams at New York University's Tandon School of Engineering specializes in. We recently covered their…

48 hours to TechCrunch Disrupt 2026 — hear directly from the people building what’s next

Less than 48 hours, TechCrunch Disrupt 2026 starts in San Francisco’s Moscone West. Save up to $100 on your pass before prices increase at the door, plus get 50% on a second pass. Or score other deals.

Impossibly tiny Swiss motor looks like anything but

If you've already designed a soft-bodied robot, it kind of defeats the purpose if you just go and stick a rigid motor inside of it. That's why Swiss scientists have created a motor that takes the form of a thin…

Next-gen hopping robot is the smart flea we didn't know we needed

We’ve already seen robots that can swim like fish, stick to walls like geckos, and grab objects like elephants. Now, engineers at the University of Washington are building a new type of robot inspired by … the flea…

Into the Omniverse: How Developers Turn Ideas Into Simulations With Frontier AI Agents

Turning a simulation idea into a working application means assembling assets, connecting physics and rendering, and checking that the scene behaves as intended. Developers are combining frontier AI models with NVIDIA…

Video Friday: Robot Decommissioning Takes a Fun Turn

Video Friday is your weekly selection of awesome robotics videos, collected by your friends at IEEE Spectrum robotics. We also post a weekly calendar of upcoming robotics events for the next few months. Please send us…

Robot Talk Episode 165 – Robots behind the research, with Kushant Patel

Claire chatted to Kushant Patel from Brookhaven National Laboratory about robots that work in scientific facilities, such as particle accelerators. Kushant Patel builds software that helps robots and instruments…

This Disembodied Hand Is All the Robot You Need

A hand attached to the end of an arm is a given for most humans, but what if robots didn’t have to play by the same rules as we do? Researchers from ETH Zurich have turned an off-the-shelf robotic hand into a completely…

Tiny robot harvests battery power via skin on its feet

Researchers have developed a paper-thin foot membrane that lets crawling microrobots harvest electricity directly from the ground beneath them, ditching heavy onboard batteries by turning metal and silicon surfaces into…

HiPHI: A Large-Scale Benchmark for High-Precision Human Motion and Object Interaction

This White Paper gives robotics researchers and engineers an overview of a new large-scale motion capture dataset built to close the data gap limiting humanoid robot learning. It also shows how policies trained on the…

What three days building a robot taught me

Last month, I went to York to build a robot. I came back with a robot, a tiny trophy-shaped sense of achievement, and somehow a few new friends. From 25th-27th August, I joined the UK RAS STEPS MicroMaze Robot Hackathon…

Planning system ensures a robot’s flight path will remain collision-free

This new method, called “SANDO,” could help disaster-response robots navigate dangerous, unknown environments.

Video: Dexterous robot hand learns the delicate art of silk embroidery

Agilink, a spin-off of Chinese robotics giant AgiBot, asked Fu Xianghong, a master of traditional Suzhou embroidery, to train its OmniHand 3 Ultra. The synthetic hand has learned to split silk strands, thread a needle…

Building a Cheap, Dexterous Robot Hand

Most of the time, assuming nothing’s gone wrong with them, we take our hands so much for granted that it’s easy to forget what remarkable pieces of engineering they are: …read more

Research could guide the future design of social robots

By the University of Glasgow Giving robot companions animal-like or anime-style faces and voices could maximise their emotional appeal to users, according to new research which could help guide the growing field of…

MIT robot swims through water via living muscle cells

An MIT robot powered by a single layer of living muscle cells swam through a watery maze, following a light held in a researcher’s hand. It is slow, tiny and nowhere near ready for the open ocean, but its thin design…

Computational tools for society’s most complex challenges

Associate Professor Cathy Wu uses reinforcement learning to help map out improvements to transportation and other multifaceted systems.

Video Friday: Albatross Falls, Spins, Self-Rights, and Sails Away

Video Friday is your weekly selection of awesome robotics videos, collected by your friends at IEEE Spectrum robotics. We also post a weekly calendar of upcoming robotics events for the next few months. Please send us…

Robot Talk Episode 164 – Accelerating robot learning, with Michelle Lu

Claire chatted to Michelle Lu from Vsim Technology about using simulation and artificial intelligence to teach robots new skills. Michelle Lu is co-founder and CEO of Vsim Technology. She was previously a Director of…

Atlas Robot’s New Hand May Outperform Humanlike Designs

Today, Boston Dynamics is announcing a redesigned hand for its Atlas robot . The previous generation could do some crazy superhuman things with its three fingers, but it was never intended for mass production in the…

Pogo-Bot Goes All Terrain With Compliant Foot

What do you get when you combine a pogo stick, a quadcopter, and engineering students from the University of Toronto? This thing, apparently– a “monopedal hopping robot” that uses a …read more

Innodata opens motion-capture lab to help humanoids move more like people

Innodata uses Vicon cameras to measure movements with sub-millimeter accuracy and to collect real-world training data for robots. The post Innodata opens motion-capture lab to help humanoids move more like people…

Robotics and automation? Informal reflections on familiar terms

By Emmet Cole “Robotics and automation” is a pairing heard often around these parts. It puts the “RA” in IEEE RAS, after all. The familiar combination shows up in conference titles, funding calls, and program…

A Day in the Life of a Roboticist: Charlie Kemp

Building useful robots starts with understanding the people who use them. For Charlie Kemp, cofounder and chief technology officer of Hello Robot, that means developing assistive robots that can help people with…

Small, medium or large, a robotic fish maintains its swimming ability

The scalable robot ScaFi. 2026 CREATE Lab EPFL. CC BY SA-4.0. Propeller-powered underwater vehicles have long helped scientists explore and monitor aquatic environments. But they’re limited by their own mechanics…

Wind-up elastic robot jumps forever when fed infrared light

Robots – that is, self-guided mechanisms interacting with or changing their environments – exist in the popular imagination as large, blocky, metallic beings like R2D2 or TARS from Interstellar. But the field of soft…

Center-Pivot System Modified to Mow Lawn

When flying over the United States, Australia, and a few other vast and relatively empty parts of the world, strange circular formations can be spotted. These are typically center-pivot irrigation …read more

FDA-cleared exoskeleton puts spinal-cord patients back on their feet

A robotic suit that lets someone with a spinal-cord injury stand up, look a friend in the eye, or stir a pot on the stove without anyone's help just cleared its biggest hurdle. The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA)…

Video Friday: Life’s Better With a Little Robot Goose

Video Friday is your weekly selection of awesome robotics videos, collected by your friends at IEEE Spectrum robotics. We also post a weekly calendar of upcoming robotics events for the next few months. Please send us…

Robot Talk Episode 163 – Robots helping people, with Aaron Edsinger

Claire chatted to Aaron Edsinger from Hello Robot about their Stretch robots that can help people with mobility issues live more independently. Aaron Edsinger is CEO and Co-Founder of Hello Robot, a robotics company…

Robot Makes Literal Daisy Chains

[Jude Robinson]’s robot Daisy has an unusual function: making a literal chain of daisies. The device is his student final project and demonstrates how a system can replace sensing with …read more

Meet Feather, the startup building the ‘Android of robotics’ for developers

Feather is betting on a customizable, $30,000 platform built for software developers.

Mexican EPICS in IEEE Team Builds Portable Educational Platform

In Guadalajara, Mexico, many high schools have motivated teachers and talented students with an interest in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics, but they lack access to advanced tools such as robotics…

Star Wars Mouse Droid is a Rebel Rave Machine

When does a droid need a party button? When it's an Imperial Mouse Droid that got a makeover from Sabine Wren. The post Star Wars Mouse Droid is a Rebel Rave Machine appeared first on Make: DIY Projects and Ideas for…

Barbara Mazzolai Wants to Build a New Field of Robotics

Throughout her career, roboticist Barbara Mazzolai has turned to nature for inspiration. Now she wants to ensure the technology she builds gives back to the environment, too. After starting her career as a biologist, a…

NVIDIA Isaac ROS 5.0 Advances Agentic, Open Source Robotics Development

To build and deploy sophisticated robotics applications that can perceive, reason and act in dynamic environments, developers need new physical AI models and tools. The ROS open framework is a project from Open Robotics…

Why Deploying Physical AI at Scale Demands Safety at Every Layer

Physical AI is moving rapidly from research to large-scale deployment. By 2035, ABI Research projects an installed base of 49 million level 3-5 autonomous vehicles (AVs), while Omdia estimates that roughly 60 million…

Teaching a Robot Hand to Walk

Although it wasn’t apparently designed with this in mind, it seems particularly fortuitous that this walking robotic hand was released in time for Halloween. Designed by researchers from ETH Zurich, …read more

Video Friday: Two Birotors Make a Quadrotor

Video Friday is your weekly selection of awesome robotics videos, collected by your friends at IEEE Spectrum robotics. We also post a weekly calendar of upcoming robotics events for the next few months. Please send us…

Robotic lab sets up and runs optics experiments on demand

The autonomous system could speed up testing of high-tech materials for applications such as solar cells, sensors, video displays, and quantum technologies.

Petoi Quaddle, a Robotic Pet for Everyone

Petoi's new Quaddle robot is their most capable and affordable quadruped yet. The post Petoi Quaddle, a Robotic Pet for Everyone appeared first on Make: DIY Projects and Ideas for Makers .

Heart of the Matter: How a Major Children’s Hospital Uses Open Source NVIDIA AI for Cardiac Care

New method enables AI for safety-critical situations

The “HardFlow” algorithm could help generative AI models produce high-quality outputs that obey strict requirements when “pretty close” doesn’t cut it.

MIT spinout turns plastic waste into resilient building materials

Atlas Building Composites is commercializing MIT research to turn plastic waste into parts for buildings and other infrastructure.

Skild AI Taps NVIDIA Physical AI to Teach Robots New Tasks From a Single Video

Manufacturing floors, warehouses and production lines rarely stay fixed — tasks change, layouts shift and new products arrive, and most robots can’t keep up without significant reprogramming. Skild AI’s new S1 robot…

Researchers tune into Arctic under-ice sounds and test through-ice communication

The work is part of a multiyear effort to develop a distributed sensor network for relaying data collected from this critical region.

System helps humans predict when self-driving cars will make mistakes

A new method, called CW-Net, translates the reasoning process of an autonomous vehicle’s AI system into understandable concepts that explain its behavior.

Microducks Exude Macro Charm

Hugging Face and Pollen Robotics have launched Microduck, an adorable $400 open source, trainable robot. The post Microducks Exude Macro Charm appeared first on Make: DIY Projects and Ideas for Makers .

NSF to invest $90M into three new technology centers, including one focused on robotics

One of the new NSF funded centers will be the Center for Human and Robot Co-Adaptation, led by The University of Texas at Austin. The post NSF to invest $90M into three new technology centers, including one focused on…

MIT engineers design a better controller for operating construction diggers

The new, more intuitive system could speed up the training process for excavator operators.

ARM Institute calls for defense manufacturing technology projects

The ARM Institute and the U.S. Department of War are seeking technology project submissions to help rapid U.S. production. The post ARM Institute calls for defense manufacturing technology projects appeared first on The…

Into the Omniverse: How Open World Models Push the Frontier of Physical AI

In July, NVIDIA joined more than 200 companies and organizations in signing “Open Weights and American AI Leadership,” an open letter arguing that AI leadership will be measured not by any single frontier model but by…

Daniela Rus receives Bavarian Minister-President's High-Tech Prize

Director of CSAIL and MIT professor honored for her contributions to robotics, artificial intelligence, and autonomous systems.

Powerful Compute So Compact, It’s Clutch — Build AI Anywhere With NVIDIA Jetson

As a discerning AI investor who values style and substance, Sarah Guo knows this season’s standout accessory isn’t the latest designer purse — but what’s inside it. In a recent video, Guo, founder of AI-native venture…

NEURA Robotics establishes NEURA Gym RWTH Aachen to train physical AI

NEURA Robotics has partnered with a German university for NEURA Gym RWTH Aachen, one of 10 facilities for training physical AI. The post NEURA Robotics establishes NEURA Gym RWTH Aachen to train physical AI appeared…

NVIDIA Open Sources First GPU-Accelerated Medical Physics Simulation Framework

Before a healthcare robot can be useful in the real world, it has to learn how the physical world pushes back. Anatomy varies. Instruments bend, press, slip and interact with tissue. Imaging can be noisy or incomplete…

Agility Robotics plants its flag in Tesla’s backyard

Agility is opening a new training center for its Digit robots in Fremont, California.

NVIDIA Introduces New Jetson Thor Computers to Advance Mainstream Robotics and Edge AI

General-purpose robots and autonomous machines are moving from research labs to real-world mass-market deployment, creating demand for compact, power-efficient AI supercomputers capable of running foundation models at…

Can AI build a jet engine? JARVIS Challenge tests role of AI copilots in tough-tech engineering

MIT students designed, built, and tested a jet engine with AI copilots, assessing AI’s usefulness in developing high-performance aerospace systems.

AI agents create virtual playgrounds to help robots get crucial training data

“SceneSmith” system uses collaborative AI agents to create realistic 3D environments of places like kitchens, hotels, and living rooms, where robots can simulate everyday chores.

NVIDIA and Hugging Face Bring New Models and Frameworks to LeRobot for the Open Robotics Community

Open source AI has shown how quickly developers can innovate when models, data and tools are shared. Robotics has the same opportunity, but advancements in physical AI development can still be gated by costly and…

How Jaiveer Singh Is Helping Robots — and Developers — Move Faster

When Jaiveer Singh talks about robots, he doesn’t begin with spectacle. He begins with infrastructure: the boards inside machines, the software that lets developers see through a robot’s cameras and the engineering…

Into the Omniverse: Three Workflows for Improving Vision AI Agent Accuracy With Synthetic Data and Fine-Tuning

Editor’s note: This post is part of Into the Omniverse, a series focused on how developers, 3D practitioners, and enterprises can transform their workflows using the latest advances in OpenUSD and NVIDIA Omniverse…

Firefly Aerospace Operates NVIDIA Jetson in Lunar Orbit for the First Time

Why everyone from OpenAI to SpaceX is building their own chips (and turning up the heat on Nvidia)

Nvidia has dominated the AI chip market for years, but the era of total dependence might be ending. OpenAI just shared its plans to spice things up with Jalapeño, its custom inference chip built with Broadcom, joining…

OpenAI’s Jalapeño chip is Big Tech’s spiciest move away from Nvidia

Nvidia has dominated the AI chip market for years, but the era of total dependence might be ending. OpenAI just shared its plans to spice things up with Jalapeño, its custom inference chip built with Broadcom, joining…

Inside XRZero-G0, a new 2,000-hour open dataset for robotics research

X Square Robot has open-sourced XRZero-G0, a framework that reduces real-robot training data requirements by up to 20x. The post Inside XRZero-G0, a new 2,000-hour open dataset for robotics research appeared first on…

For Robotaxis, Safety Must Be Built In, Not Bolted On

Editor’s note: The name of NVIDIA DRIVE Hyperion was changed to NVIDIA Hyperion in September 2026. All references to the name have been updated in this blog. A car pulls up to the curb. The app says, “Your ride is…

Mitsubishi Electric opens Serendie Street Boston digital transformation hub

Mitsubishi Electric opened Serendie Street Boston, its first Western digital transformation hub dedicated to collaboration and innovation. The post Mitsubishi Electric opens Serendie Street Boston digital transformation…

Win $1,000 — Robotics Dream Keeper Challenge: Build Real AI Robots with RDK X5 Dev Kit

The Robotics Dream Keeper Challenge is a newbie-friendly program designed to help makers bring intelligent robots to life using the RDK X5 dev board. The post Win $1,000 — Robotics Dream Keeper Challenge: Build Real AI…

Program a Brain on Wheels With SpikerBot

With SpikerBot robot from Backyard Brains, kids can design lifelike behaviors and learn neuroscience, no lines of code needed. The post Program a Brain on Wheels With SpikerBot appeared first on Make: DIY Projects and…

Chatty C-3PO (Threepio) Explores Human-AI Relations

Student Sam Potozkin built a talking C-3PO head that's big on realism. The post Chatty C-3PO (Threepio) Explores Human-AI Relations appeared first on Make: DIY Projects and Ideas for Makers .

Meta buys robotics startup to bolster its humanoid AI ambitions

Meta bought humanoid startup Assured Robot Intelligence to beef up its AI models for robots, the company said.

Project CETI deploys autonomous underwater gliders to better observe sperm whales

Project CETI has deployed a new underwater glider that can monitor whales for longer than the organization's previous methods. The post Project CETI deploys autonomous underwater gliders to better observe sperm whales…

MassRobotics to promote ecosystem growth at 2026 Robotics Summit & Expo

MassRobotics will spotlight resident, physical AI, and healthcare startups, as well as women in robotics and university teams at the 2026 Robotics Summit. The post MassRobotics to promote ecosystem growth at 2026…

Hands On with ROS 2: Nodes, Topics, and Services

Learn how to use the Robot Operating System in this introduction ROS 2 for hobbyists and engineers. The post Hands On with ROS 2: Nodes, Topics, and Services appeared first on Make: DIY Projects and Ideas for Makers .

Robotics Medal and Rising Star winners reflect on their work, advancing women in robotics

For International Women's Day, Dr. Maja Matarić and Dr. Tania Morimoto discussed their current robotics research and student development. The post Robotics Medal and Rising Star winners reflect on their work, advancing…

Toyota contracts seven Agility humanoid robots for Canadian factory

The robots will be unloading totes full of auto parts from an automated warehouse tugger.

Introducing Sprout, a new humanoid development platform

Fauna Robotics unveils Sprout: a safe, character-driven robot designed to live, work, and play alongside humans in everyday life. The post Introducing Sprout, a new humanoid development platform appeared first on The…

From Shoe Box to Smart Robot: A Maker’s Journey to Autonomy

In a niche corner of the internet where creators still surprise audiences with real animatronics rather than CGI, Jesse Velez reveals the process behind the most impressive sci-fi props. The post From Shoe Box to Smart…

Boston Dynamics shows Atlas humanoid working at Georgia Hyundai plant

In a 60 Minutes segment, Boston Dynamics provided a glimpse at how its Atlas humanoid is becoming more capable. The post Boston Dynamics shows Atlas humanoid working at Georgia Hyundai plant appeared first on The Robot…

Looking back at iRobot’s diversification attempts through the years

We look back at some of the many robots that iRobot developed in addition to the Roomba over the past 35 years. The post Looking back at iRobot’s diversification attempts through the years appeared first on The Robot…

LimX Dynamics unveils TRON 2 shape-shifting limbed robot

The TRON 2 modular tri-form robot supports dual-arm, wheeled, and bipedal configurations for integrated VLA research and development. The post LimX Dynamics unveils TRON 2 shape-shifting limbed robot appeared first on…

EY rolls out physical AI platform, opens EY.ai Lab, and names global robotics lead

EY does not make robots, but it is working on a platform and a lab to help companies simulate and manage physical AI. The post EY rolls out physical AI platform, opens EY.ai Lab, and names global robotics lead appeared…

The world is just not quite ready for humanoids yet

Despite the amount of money being injected into the industry, humanoids won't be able to learn dexterity -- or the fine motor movements with hands -- rendering them essentially useless.

Diligent Robotics hires two notable Cruise alumni to its leadership team

Diligent Robotics hired Cruise's former chief operating officer and former head of AI and robotics into c-suite positions.

Tesla sues former Optimus engineer over alleged trade secret theft

Tesla alleges that Zhongjie Li stole confidential trade secrets and used them to launch a robotics startup a week after he left Tesla.

Hugging Face unveils two new humanoid robots

AI dev platform Hugging Face continued its push into robotics on Thursday with the release of two new humanoid robots.

Why Intempus thinks robots should have a human physiological state

Teddy Warner, 19, has always been interested in robotics. His family was in the industry, and he says he “grew up” working in a machinist shop while in high school. Now Warner is building a robotics company of his own…

Robots run a half-marathon, slowly

It looks like humanoid robots have a long way to go before catching up with human runners. Beijing’s E-Town tech hub hosted what it described as the world’s first humanoid half-marathon on Saturday, with 21 humanoid…

1X will test humanoid robots in ‘a few hundred’ homes in 2025

Norwegian robotics startup 1X plans to start early tests of its humanoid robot, Neo Gamma, in “a few hundred to a few thousand” homes by the end of 2025, according to the company’s CEO, Bernt Børnich. “Neo Gamma is…

Boston Dynamics joins forces with its former CEO to speed the learning of its Atlas humanoid robot

Boston Dynamics Wednesday announced a partnership designed to bring improved reinforcement learning to its electric Atlas humanoid robot. The tie-up is with the Robotics & AI Institute (RAI Institute), earlier known as…