Baxter dual-arm collaborative robot

Baxter dual-arm collaborative robot, with two plastic carrying boxes containing alternative gripper attachments, designed and made by Rethink Robotics, United States, and Active Robots Limited, Radstock, Bath and North East Somerset, England, 2012-2016

Baxter was the world’s first two-armed robot designed to work together with people. Baxter comes in two versions. The manufacturing version is designed for tasks such as sorting, picking and placing, and machine loading. The research version is designed for use in robotics laboratories and comes with an open-source software development kit. The more objects Baxter is familiar with, the less time it takes to train it at new tasks. To that end, Brown University created a challenge for Baxter robots with spare time to learn 1 million new objects.

This Baxter is programmed to: scan objects with the cameras in its hands, then try to grab them, store what it learns in an open-access database, use facial expressions to indicate whether it is thinking, has learnt an object or is resting, and minimise impact from collisions and avoid squashing objects, using its force sensors and spring-loaded arms and joints