Institute for Personal Robots in Education Blog

There is much going on here and it will be hard to post all the highlights. Those interested should contact AAAI for a copy of the Symposium papers. There are papers from all over the US (K-12, university level), and many countries (Israel, Canada, Ghana, Qatar...) represented.

I wanted to provide a quick overview of the robot platforms that were demo-ed here (again in no particular order):

1. The Surveyor Robot from Howard Gordon: This has already been reviewed here, See Doug's blog below)

2. The Parallax Scribbler: Also reviewed here (see below)

3. The LEGO Mindstorms NXT: Also reviewed here (see below)

4. iRobot Create (uses the same base as the Roomba robot): This $150 base robot is being used at many institutions. To do anything useful you do have to add on at least another $150-300 worth of hardware. Maja Matric announced that a book of curricular materials will be available this June (a primer published by MIT Press). This robot will soon be controllable using IPRE's Myro software. Look for a review here soon.

5. Ridgesoft's IntelliBrain robot: A small, $150 robot that now has a Pyro interface (in addition to Java already provided by Ridgesoft)

6. The e-puck robot (see www.e-puck.org) or Road Narrows web site.

7. The new Khepera (from K-Team. See Road Narrows web site)

8. The Qwerk box from CMU

9. The XBC from KIPR

10. Fred Martin's showed off the new Blackfin Handyboard

11. SoccerBot/EyeBot from Androtec.com

The papers also mentioned many other robot platforms including aerial blimp robots, robot arms, and several other devices.

But the running theme here is the price point. Low-cost robots are in (i.e. under $500) and are proliferating quickly.

Deepak.