Robots - History and Applications

The first usage of the word Robot was by the Czech Playright Karel Capek in his play Rossum's Universal Robots in the year 1921. The term at that time stood for forced labor or a serf.

In 1956, there was a legendary meeting between George Devol an entrepreneur and Joseph Engelberger an engineer. The two gentlmen, over cocktails, had a long discussion on the writings of Issac Asimov about robotics. They decided to build a robot.

They were successful in their efforts. Engelberger started a manufacturing company and called it Unimation Inc. The first Unimate, as the robot was called, was installed at the General Motors plant to extract die casts from die casting machines and to carry out spot welding on automobile bodies.

The Robot was a runaway success and Unimation was bought by the company Westinghouse. The Unimate is still in production, today as you read this article.

Robots are programmable and self controlled devices. They consist of electronic, electrical and mechanical sub units. Robots carry out a lot of dangerous tasks and functions that humans used to perform. Robots can face dangers as their responses can be better controlled than human beings. They can carry out tasks, repetitively, day in and day out, without getting tired, distracted or feeling monotonous. Robots work with radioactive materials in atomic labs. They handle a lot of dangerous radioactive substances.

Robots today have sensory systems that are highly advanced. These systems process information. These robots function as if they have brain in them. The brain in the robot is the form of computerized artificial intelligence. The robot can perceive conditions because of artificial intelligence. The robots decide the path of action based on those conditions.

Robots have been predicted to become the reality of the future and are now an integral part of science fiction based novels and movies. The fact is that robots are a reality. The wars between robots shown on the silver screen however are fiction. Continuous advancement in robotics is taking place. However the day is very far off, when robots will start to behave and think like human beings do.