How to Optimize Your Home for Robot Servants

Robots can walk, talk, run a hotel … and are entirely stumped by a doorknob. Sure, the SpotMini, a doglike domestic helper from Boston Dynamics, can climb stairs, but it struggles to reliably hand over a can of soda. That's why some roboticists think the field needs to flip its perspective. "There are two approaches to building robots," says Maya Cakmak, a researcher at the University of Washington. "Make the robot more humanlike to handle the environment, or design the environment to make it a better fit for the robot."