Toyota Motor Corp. has unveiled an upgraded version of its human-shaped T-HR3 robot. The robot, which is controlled remotely by a person wearing a headset and wiring on his or her arms and hands, now has faster and smoother finger movements because the controlling device is lighter and easier to use. Such a robot could, in the future, be used to perform surgery in a distant place where a doctor cannot travel. It also might allow people to feel like they're participating in events they can't actually attend. In a recent demonstration in Tokyo, a person wearing a headset and wiring made the robot move in exactly the same way he was moving, waving or making dance-like movements.

PARIS – France has officially deployed its first armed drones, three American-built Reapers fitted with laser-guided missiles, in its fight against a jihadi insurrection in Africa's Sahel region, Defense Minister Florence Parly announced Thursday. The drones, which have already since 2014 provided surveillance support to the French anti-jihadi Barkhane mission in Mali, Niger and Burkina Faso, will from now on also be able to strike targets, she said. France joins a small club of countries, including the United States, Britain and Israel, that use armed, distance-piloted aircraft in combat. The Reapers will each carry two 250-kg (550-pound) laser-guided bombs, and are entering service after a series of operational tests carried out from the airbase in the Niger capital Niamey. "Their main missions remain surveillance and intelligence … but these can be extended to strikes," Parly said.

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Toyota has revealed the next update of its T-HR3 humanoid'avatar' service robot ahead of next year's Olympic Games. The robot is capable of flexible movements that mirror the actions of its human operators up to six miles away, almost in real time. Using a 5G connection and a human controller connected to wiring and a VR headset, the new T-HR3 is now able to execute more difficult tasks than before. This includes walking in a smoother, more natural manner and even preparing drinks, as demonstrated at this year's International Robotic Exhibition in Tokyo. The new and improved T-HR3 – which was first launched in 2017 – grasps a cocktail shaker at this year's International Robotic Exhibition in Tokyo'Avatar robots like T-HR3, which possess an actual body, are capable of going beyond VR to physically influence the real world,' said T-HR3 Development Team Leader Tomohisa Moridaira.

Scientists have pulled inspiration from insects in order to create a tiny, resilient robot. Referred to as'DEAnsect', this bug-like robot is made of soft materials, carries five times its weight and moves its artificial muscles 400 times a second. What makes this creation so unique that it is able to withstand multiple hits from a fly swatter, being folded or squashed without being damaged – making this robot design ideal for performing various tasks. DEAnsect was developed by a team from École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL) in Switzerland working with the Integrated Actuators Laboratory (LAI) and colleagues from the University of Cergy-Pontoise, France. DEAnsect is designed with dielectric elastomer actuators (DEAs),which is a type of hair-thin artificial muscle that propels it forward through vibrations. Scientists have pulled inspiration from insects in order to create a tiny, resilient robot.

People's understanding of supposedly'equivalent' words used to express emotions -- such as love, fear or anxiety -- vary greatly between different languages, a study found. Researchers studied words describing emotion in more than 2,000 languages and found'significant variation' in how emotions are expressed across cultures. For example, the researchers found that among the languages of the Pacific Islands, the words equivalent to the English word'surprise' are closely associated with'fear'. In contrast, the words for surprise in the languages of south-east Asia are more closely connected to concepts like'hope' and'wanting'. The team also found words with no equivalent in other languages, like Portuguese's'saudade', a deep melancholy for something lost, which has no English counterpart.

In October last year, for example, AI-generated art hit the headlines when auction house Christie's New York sold an AI-created artwork for $432,000. AI is also being used in music production, with a new industry being built around the use of AI in music. The musician Taryn Southern has used an artificial intelligence platform called Amper to create an entire album, called I AM AI. The album was the first LP to be entirely composed and produced using AI. A patented AI system called "DABUS", created by Dr Stephen Thaler, can devise and develop new ideas.

Computers have learned to see the world more clearly in recent years, thanks to some impressive leaps in artificial intelligence. But you might be surprised--and upset--to know what these AI algorithms really think of you. As a recent experiment demonstrated, the best AI vision system might see a picture of your face and spit out a racial slur, a gender stereotype, or a term that impugns your good character. Now the scientists who helped teach machines to see have removed some of the human prejudice lurking in the data they used during the lessons. The changes can help AI to see things more fairly, they say.

HOUSTON, TEXAS - NOVEMBER 1: A Nuro delivery vehicle completes training routes around the Meyerland ... [ ] neighborhood on Nov. 1, 2019, in Houston, TX. (Photo by Annie Mulligan for The Washington Post via Getty Images) The California Department of Motor Vehicles will soon allow light-duty autonomous vehicles to be tested in a commercial setting on public roads. That means that delivery vehicles weighing less than 10,001 pounds (which includes Class 1 and 2 passenger trucks and vehicles, small delivery vans, scooters and the like) will soon be delivering groceries, pizza and who knows what else in the Golden State. Obviously, Arizona has been cool with this for a while, which is why we've seen fully autonomous Waymo rides in that state already. KRCR reports that California's new rules are similar to what's been allowed in the state so far, with distinctions for testing with a safety driver in the car, without anyone inside and whether or not the vehicles can be tested on public roads. As of December 5th, there are 65 companies that have a permit to test autonomous vehicles on public roads in California with a safety driver in the vehicle.

Hyper-converged vendors Pivot3 and Scale Computing this week expanded their use cases with product launches. Scale formally unveiled HE150 all-flash NVMe hyper-converged infrastructure (HCI) appliances for space-constrained edge environments. Scale sells the compute device as a three-node cluster, but it does not require a server rack. The new device is a tiny version of the Scale HE500 HCI appliances that launched this year. Scale said select customers have deployed proofs of concept.