The adoption of mobile robotic platforms in complex environments, such as agricultural settings, requires these systems to exhibit a flexible yet effective architecture that integrates perception and control. In such scenarios, several tasks need to be accomplished simultaneously, ranging from managing robot limits to performing operational tasks and handling human inputs. The purpose of this paper is to present a comprehensive control architecture for achieving complex tasks such as robotized harvesting in vineyards within the framework of the European project CANOPIES. In detail, a 16-DOF dual-arm mobile robot is employed, controlled via a Hierarchical Quadratic Programming (HQP) approach capable of handling both equality and inequality constraints at various priorities to harvest grape bunches selected by the perception system developed within the project. Furthermore, given the complexity of the scenario and the uncertainty in the perception system, which could potentially lead to collisions with the environment, the handling of interaction forces is necessary. Remarkably, this was achieved using the same HQP framework. This feature is further leveraged to enable semi-autonomous operations, allowing a human operator to assist the robotic counterpart in completing harvesting tasks. Finally, the obtained results are validated through extensive testing conducted first in a laboratory environment to prove individual functionalities, then in a real vineyard, encompassing both autonomous and semi-autonomous grape harvesting operations.

We all could use a little help keeping our homes clean, and now we live in an age where robots are actually capable of lending a (mechanical) hand. Robot vacuums are some of the most ubiquitous smart home gadgets available today with their circular shapes and propensity for bumping into walls. While they provide an undeniable convenience, they can also be expensive. It's not unheard of to drop close to $1,000 on a high-end robo-vac. But in a change from just a few years ago, today there are now plenty of budget robot vacuum options to choose from.

There is an exciting, and varied, programme of eight invited talks at the International Joint Conference on Artificial Intelligence (IJCAI-21) this year. On the opening day of the conference, we heard presentations from Edith Elkind (University of Oxford), who talked about fairness in multiwinner voting, and Masahiro Fujita (SonyAI) who discussed combining AI and robotics for augmenting human abilities. Edith works in algorithmic game theory, with a focus on algorithms for collective decision making and coalition formation. She began by giving a brief overview of the field of computational social choice. This area of research, at the interface of social choice theory and computer science, really began in earnest following COMSOC '06, the first International Workshop on Computational Social Choice.

Ingenuity demonstrates the ways in which the field of Artificial Intelligence has already improved in leaps and bounds. It should be noted that the helicopter is not entirely free from human intervention; it can be controlled when it needs to be. Ingenuity does have a sequenced engine and responds to commands from Earth, but for the duration that the robot is actively carrying out those commands, it runs autonomously. Whilst travelling from A to B, Ingenuity's guidance software takes over and will execute the helicopter's take off, landing and course without the need of human intervention, modelling a'half-house' AI system. The helicopter's semi-autonomous nature allows the device to be more pragmatic and address any threats or challenges that may arise: blockades and restraints to name but two.

Attitudes about nuclear energy are changing, with pundits on both sides of the aisle touting its benefits for extremely efficient and relatively clean energy. Despite an ever more positive public opinion, the nuclear industry in the United States, the largest in the world, is currently experiencing a downturn, even going so far as to need government subsidies to keep afloat. In fact, at present the fastest growing sector of the nuclear industry is profiting not off of growth, but off of the nuclear sector's slow death in the United States. According to reporting by Bloomberg, "the fastest growing part of the nuclear industry in the U.S. involves a small but expanding group of companies that specialize in tearing reactors down faster and cheaper than ever before." Tearing down old nuclear reactors is no easy feat, however.

A vision of what life on Mars and the moon could look like has been revealed in a series of incredible concept images. The stunning shots reveal the 3D-printed homes and automated vehicles that could one day cover the surface of the planet. They were created by the firm set up by designer Norman Foster, perhaps best known in the technology world for his work on Apple's newly constructed'spaceship' campus in Cupertino, California. A vision of what life on Mars and the moon could look like has been revealed in an incredible series of concept images. The stunning shots reveal the 3D-printed houses and automated vehicles that will scatter the surface of future Mars and lunar colonies.

Caltech professor Aaron Ames walks on campus alongside Cassie, a semi-autonomous robot, as doctoral student Jacob Reher, left, controls the direction that Cassie travels. The robot's balance and gait are autonomous. Caltech professor Aaron Ames walks on campus alongside Cassie, a semi-autonomous robot, as doctoral student Jacob Reher, left, controls the direction that Cassie travels. The robot's balance and gait are autonomous. The mechanical "clack, clack, clack" of an orange robot on the march brought Caltech's new indoor drone arena to life.