The Brain Behind The Machine

Izhikevich’s startup, Brain Corporation, based in San Diego, has developed an operating system for robots called BrainOS to make that possible. To teach a robot running the software to pick up trash, for example, you would use a remote control to repeatedly guide its gripper to perform that task. After just minutes of repetition, the robot would take the initiative and start doing the task for itself. “Once you train it, it’s fully autonomous,” says Izhikevich, who is cofounder and CEO of the company.

IIzhikevich says the approach will make it easier to produce low-cost service robots capable of simple tasks. Programming robots to behave intelligently normally requires significant expertise, he says, pointing out that the most successful home robot today is the Roomba, released in 2002. The Roomba is preprogrammed to perform one main task: driving around at random to cover as much of an area of floor as possible. Hmmm, me thinks he is taking a page form Rodney Brook’s Baxter robot, see my previous reports.

Brain hopes to be the software step-sister to Rethink Robotics, as it plans to make money by providing its software to entrepreneurs and companies that want to bring intelligent, low-cost robots to market. Later this year, Brain Corporation will start offering a ready-made circuit board with a smartphone processor and BrainOS installed to certain partners. Building a trainable robot would involve connecting that “brain” to a physical robot body.

In a demo last week, the robot, called EyeRover, was steered along a specific route around a chair, sofa, and other obstacles a few times. It then repeated the route by itself. In a second demo, the robot was taught to come when a person beckoned to it. One person held one hand close to the robot’s twin cameras, so that EyeRover could lock onto it. A second person then maneuvered the robot forward and back in synchronization with the trainer’s hand. After being led through a rehearsal of the movements just twice, the robot correctly came when summoned.Those quick examples are hardly sophisticated. But Izhikevich says more extensive training conducted over days or weeks could teach a robot to perform a more complicated task such as pulling weeds out of the ground.A company would need to train only one robot, and could then copy its software to new robots with the same design before they headed to store shelves.

Brain Corporation’s software is based on a combination of several different artificial intelligence techniques. Much of the power comes from using artificial neural networks, which are inspired by the way brain cells communicate, says Izhikevich. Brain Corporation was previously collaborating with Qualcomm on new forms of chip that write artificial neural networks into silicon. Those “neuromorphic” chips, as they are known, are purely research projects for the moment. But they might eventually offer a more powerful and efficient way to run software like BrainOS.

The BrainOs brings to mind our own functioning, and the potential to re-train ourselves to do better in the coming year of 5775 – Shana Tova Umetukah!

* Thanks to MIT Technology Report for bringing this to my attention…

The Brain Behind The Machine

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