Combining Pneumatics with Artificial Intelligence

As the division between manual production work performed by humans and automated work handled by robots and other equipment becomes less concrete, an array of new tools is coming to market to facilitate this burgeoning flexibility. Within the past year, we've reported on the introduction of the Mate exoskeleton--a wearable robotic technology designed to assist human shoulder movement in production operations, and FT-Produktion's use of the RG2 double gripper to provide a single robot arm with two "hands" for parts feeding. Now, we've learned that Festo has developed a Bionic SoftHand and Bionic SoftArm--pneumatic robot technologies designed to extend human capabilities into the automation realm. According to Festo, the fingers of the BionicSoftHand "consist of flexible bellows structures with air chambers. The bellows are enclosed in the fingers by a special 3D textile coat knitted from high-strength elastic threads. This makes it light, flexible, adaptable and sensitive, yet capable of exerting strong forces."