Students from the University of Pennsylvania GRASP Laboratory have yet again created something truly frightening impressive. The autonomous quadrotors have been able to work together for quite some time now, but have recently gained the ability to build.
Claws have been added to the underbelly of the quadrotors for grasping modular magnetic parts, which can be snapped together to form cubic structures. Once told what to build, the quadrotors are able to figure out the assembly plans without any further user input.
“Our algorithm can construct nearly any tower like structure like the one shown here. We are only limited by the batter life of the quadrotor and the number of parts available.”
Luckily for the future of humanity, the quadrotors depend on external IR cameras to determine their relative position, so they can only function properly in a contained environment… for now.
(via Engadget)
Published: Jan 16, 2011 05:00 pm