UTS robots to the rescue

Robots will soon roll out to where no man dares to go, locating survivors in disaster zones, and Sydney talent is getting them there.

Researchers from the University of Technology, Sydney (UTS) and the University of New South Wales (UNSW) have brought home trophies at this year’s Robocup Rescue Challenge in Graz, Austria.

The joint Sydney team came first in the Autonomy category, and second in the Mobility category, finishing fifth overall in the competition in which autonomous and remote-contolled robots are deployed to navigate simulated disaster areas and find dummy victims.

Senior Research Fellow at the UTS Centre for Intelligent Mechatronic Systems and team member Jaime Valls Miro said the competition was merely a fun way to showcase the advancements being made in robotics.

The use of mobile robots for urban search and rescue has attracted increasing attention over recent years.

Robots are primarily used to minimise human casualties by surveying a disaster area before rescue workers enter.

Autonomous robots must be capable of reacting independently to the chaotic surrounds of disaster environments.

Rescue robots have been tested in earthquake disaster zones and were used to help locate victims after the 2001 attacks on the World Trade Centre.
But Mr Miro said the UTS/UNSW-designed robots were still not capable of being reliably used in real disaster situations.

“We’re not there yet, and proof of that is that we can’t really deploy these things in real scenarios unless they’re actually being human-operated,” he said. “Our aim is actually to remove the human element.”

Launched in 1997, Robocup is an international competition designed to promote research into artificial intelligence and robotics.