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Self-adapting robots, Artificial intelligence in medicine, Ageing healthily

Tracey Logan examines technology to enable robots to remain fully autonomous when damaged in hostile environments and hears how clues to healthy ageing lie in hibernating lemurs.

We're becoming more reliant on robots to assist in hostile zones from extinguishing forest fires to bomb disposal to decontaminating nuclear facilities. But whereas humans can quickly adapt to injuries, current robots cannot 'think outside the box' to find a new behaviour when they get damaged. Tracey Logan speaks to computer scientist Jeff Clune who's developed a new way to allow robots to adapt to damage in less than two minutes. It will enable more robust, effective, autonomous robots, and may shed light on the principles that animals use to adapt to injury.

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30 minutes

Broadcasts

  • Thu 28 May 2015 16:30
  • Thu 28 May 2015 21:00

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