Advancing robotic manipulation of deformable objects can enable automation of repetitive tasks across multiple industries, from food processing to textiles and healthcare. Yet robots struggle with the high dimensionality of deformable objects and their complex dynamics. While data-driven methods have shown potential for solving manipulation tasks, their application in the domain of deformable objects has been constrained by the lack of data. To address this, we propose PokeFlex, a pilot dataset featuring real-world 3D mesh data of actively deformed objects, together with the corresponding forces and torques applied by a robotic arm, using a simple poking strategy. Deformations are captured with a professional volumetric capture system that allows for complete 360-degree reconstruction. The PokeFlex dataset consists of five deformable objects with varying stiffness and shapes. Additionally, we leverage the PokeFlex dataset to train a vision model for online 3D mesh reconstruction from a single image and a template mesh. We refer readers to the supplementary material and to our website ( https://pokeflex-dataset.github.io/ ) for demos and examples of our dataset.

We already wrote about it earlier this week but here's a reminder: The Ghost Recon Wildlands demo marketing stunt open beta runs this weekend, so if you're bored on Saturday and want to give the game a spin before plunking down $60, now's your chance. What else happened this week? Overwatch teased a new hero, Battlefield 1 teased a new...something, Prey showed off its toilet paper physics, Humble decided to sell a billion hours of Civilization for $15, and someone installed Doom on a Porsche 911. If you've heard 25 years of Civilization praise and thought "I should play those games some day," I have one hell of a deal for you: Most of the Civilization games, packed into a bundle. A Humble Bundle, that is.