MIT’s New Chip Gives Tiny Robots 3D Vision
Before a robot can navigate through the world around it, it needs some awareness of its surroundings. The best, most detailed information comes from 3D maps. These maps assist robots in planning collision-free paths to their destinations and in manipulating nearby objects. However, generating 3D maps requires a lot of equipment. Machines have to be loaded down with bulky, power-hungry, and expensive sensors and processing units to produce these maps.
Where does that leave the tiniest of robots? With subpar navigation systems, to put it lightly. But a new chip developed by MIT researchers could change that in the future. Their creation can generate 3D maps without the bulk of traditional systems, and it only uses about as much energy as a single LED.
Gleanmer turns depth images into a 3D occupancy map (📷: Z. Fu et al.)
The chip, called Gleanmer, was designed specifically for small autonomous systems where...
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