This Is Robotics: Radio News

TOP 5 ROBOTICS TECH TRENDS FOR 2023

That’s followed by the Top 5 Robotics Tech Trends for 2023. It’s our What’s New in Robotics? column from our partnering with Robotiq. The experts have made their forecasts, and we’ve got the Top 5. They’re awesome picks

What’s New in Robotics? Robotiq Blog 30.12.2022

KRISPY KREME GOES BIG TIME FOR ROBOTS
With cobots elbowing themselves into the food business like with White Castle burgers and Chipotle’s Chippy, the tortilla-chip-making cobot, both from Miso Robotics, what about confections, and the sweet-tooth crowd? Are robots in their future, too?  Well, yes… Krispy Kreme, the 85-year-old, NC-based donut giant. is going robot.

SPACE JUNK & ROBOTS
We’ll visit with Space Junk in Low-Earth Orbit. Whether it’s mom’s dinner table or outer space, we haven’t learned to clean up after ourselves. Meet the robots that want to take on the chore.

Space Robots to Sweep Up Orbiting Debris

CAPSULE ROBOTICS
Instrument-free, noninvasive diagnosis and therapy inside the digestive tract will be performed through a new branch of robotics: capsule robotics.

Capsule Robotics: In the Future, All Surgery “Non-Invasive”

CHINA TO AMP UP ROBOT USAGE 2023-2025
Already the world’s largest buyer of industrial robots for 9 straight years. A country that buys on average 21,000 industrial robots a month!

Does that sound like a country that needs to “Amp Up” its robot usage?

Yes, and there’s good reason for it.

China’s got a failing grade for its “Made in China 2025” plan in which it promised 50% of all industrial robots bought would be homemade by Chinese robot makers. Today, that’s at 39%!  

More worrisome still, China registered more deaths than births last year, marking 2022 as the first time the country’s population has dropped since the 1960s. Fewer workers mean a need for more automation; robots primary substitute.

China’s new plan for 2023: “Robot + Application Action Plan”

INTERVIEW PT. 1: MARK MESSINA CEO ADDVERB: FIRST YEAR IN NA & MICROLOGISTICS

Mark’s insights and outlook for how logistics will deal with Micrologistics, 5G and Cybersecurity in 2023.

WHAT’S NEW IN ROBOTICS? AFTERMATH OF CES2023 GOOD FOR ROBOTICS?
CES for 2023 came and went quietly this year (January 5 to 8, Las Vegas), minus much of the online-hoopla that for weeks preceding its opening usually attends the world’s largest consumer electronics show.

Attendees looking for robots at CES2023 also got a quiet show.

Post-COVID (since 2021), CES simply has yet to fully recover and return to its heady times of years past. A half-day’s rambling about would have been enough to see all the robots at CES2023 that really mattered.

As Brian Heater of TechCrunch remarked: “At some point when we weren’t looking, CES became a car show.”

Isn’t it time we asked ourselves: “Should Robotics Events Have an Exclusive Online TV Network?”

There’s the Travel Channel, the Cooking Network, HGTV, Court TV, the Golf Channel, and myriad others. Why not a 24×7 Robotics TV Network?

See also Robotiq’s blog: See also: What’s New in Robotics? 13.01.2023

INTERVIEW PT. 2: MARK MESSINA CEO ADDVERB: 5G & CYBERSECURITY FOR LOGISTICS

Mark’s insights and outlook for how logistics will deal with 5G and Cybersecurity in 2023. Mark offers up a fascinating insider’s look at 5G and protecting logistics assets from his twin viewpoints as both a logistics engineer and an executive business leader delivering intra-logistics automation for Addverb Technologies.

FABULOUS FEBRUARY

Hi everyone and welcome to This Is Robotics for February. 

It’s been a mere two months into 2023 and already big things, major innovations, are happening in robotics.

And some of them are quite fabulous and are the harbinger of follow-on innovations that are even more fabulous.

Because of what’s popped to the surface these last  2 months, we’re going into full-stop mode for This Is Robotics for February Episode 17. We’re calling it Fabulous February.

Because, If this is what the first two months of 2023 are like for robotics, the remaining 10 months may well be the best in years.

We’ll take a look at Service robotics, logistics, then cobots x3 with one of them being  the arrival of the ultimate, affordable, and simple-to-use cobot for SMEs at $9k.

I’ve been writing about cobots for ten years, and this is the first to come along that’s tailor-made for SMEs and its not from an old-line robot maker or a new-line cobot maker; it’s from a 50-year-old, German company that makes high-performance plastics. The company is named igus, and the cobot is called the ReBel. And it could easily revolutionize the use of cobots for SMEs.

 How about a personal robot as family historian?

All the elements to build one exist, there needs only a company smart enough to take it on. Perfect for ancestry.com.

Instead of a family scrap book or memory sticks of media loaded with a family’s life events and special occasions, what about an undying, self-repairing home robot as family historian that records and stores everything.  

A family robot that would record (audio and video) of the good, bad, and ugly of a family all year long, and then with the help of generative AI, organize it all into an annual movie co-narrated by Orson Wells and Lauren Becall (both deceased but with AI anything is possible)? Narrator choice is up to you.

It’s the ultimate hand-me-down, like the grandfather clock of robots.

OKAY, LET’S GET ON WITH Fabulous February. 

Hi everyone and welcome, I’m Tom Green, your host for this episode of  This Is Robotics, and your fellow companion on one of the most incredible journeys in human history: robotics.

Thanks so much for tuning us in today.

March 20th, at 5:24 p.m. EDT) spring rolled in. It’s that time of year when the ground begins to thaw, birds return, and many vendors introduce their outdoor robots. Outdoors meaning robots for backyards, construction sites, farms, and major infrastructure projects most everywhere. In short, it’s springtime for robots.

In honor of March, we’ll review some of these new spring robots for 2023. Renovate Robotics, Swap Robotics, Built Robotics, and GlüxKind.

Then, we’re off to Korea as Korea makes its $177 billion move at becoming a robotics kingpin: trying to be the third or fourth-largest producer of robots worldwide, as well as making a strong move on leadership in artificial intelligence. Big things are happening in Korea, and robotics will be a direct beneficiary of Korea’s remarkable plan for AI leadership, not only in East Asia and Asia…but the entire globe.

Articles in Asian Robotics Review:
Major Growth Spurt Ahead for Korean Robotics
2023-2026 Korea could leapfrog competition through integration of robotics, AI/ML, and ICT

Korea’s Plan for AI/ML Dominance…Brilliant!
Korea looks to ramp up artificial intelligence and converge with recent successes in robotics (6x growth from 2009 to 2016). Can Korea pull it off?

Our last two segments for this episode ask the question: What happened?
Generative AI: Finally, America Gets a Real Wake-up Call

In 1983, the United States had 50-plus manufacturers of industrial robots. Today there are zero…as in none! Well, excepting for the recent one ABB in 2015 (Swiss/Swedish conglomerate) built in Michigan. Americans are left to “assembling” other peoples’ robots. Even though the U.S invented robots. 

What if there’s a supply-chain fiasco preventing shipments? Or worse, what if embargos from  US alliances make it impossible to import from Germany, Japan, Italy or China.? What has that mean’t for manufacturing in the U.S. today? Will America’s logistics go the same way as industrial robots.

Between 2000 and 2010, the US lost one-third of its manufacturing jobs. The US remains the second-largest manufacturing country in the world, but its global dominance has been well and truly lost.

What happened? And is this decline a harbinger of what Generative AI might do in the very near future? We’ll let you know what the leadership of DHL, a company that ships 5 billion packages annually, says about the situation.

Finally, our last news report: Machine Tool Kingpins: Germany, Japan & China Machine tools keys to the future of global manufacturing. See also Asian Robotics Review news report and free downloadable PDF from Bismarck Analysis on machine tools.

The Importance of Machine Tools
To Have and Have Not: Advanced Manufacturing’s Most Important Skill

Hi folks, and welcome once again to This Is Robotics: Radio News, Episode #19

For two years running now, we are the #1 Robotics News Podcast worldwide…and you my dear folks put us at #1. Thank you very much.

Thanks for joining us today

Topping the news of the month is Walmart with its blockbuster 5-year plan filled to the brim with automation and robots.  A story we call: Walmart Goes All-In for Robots.

In short, it’s a massive upside for the entire robotics industry.

That’s sure to prompt other retailers to follow suit. Some already have and are ahead of Walmart. Even Walmart’s suppliers are sure to speed things up as well. Got to get those gazillions of cans of Campbell’s soup shipped to Walmart’s 4700 stores either fast or faster.

Walmart vendors winning out: Symbotic, GreyOrange & Alert Innovation.

Check out the Robotiq blog for the full story

Then we’re off to a factory automation story circa 1803, the world’s very first automated factory, from which the reverberations, here 200 years later, still ring out loudly. The noted historian Simon Winchester wrote about it, and he’ll narrate what happened.

The Future of Warehouse Work: Technological Change in the U.S. Logistics Industry.

As he does, think about robot-driven automation in today’s warehouses and factories. There’s a lot of relevance for where today’s automation is headed.

Following Simon and the world’s first automated factory from 1803, is our piece on Australian robotics.

Once high-flying, Australian robotics went into an eclipse after the 2014 budget cuts. Listen to the sadly haunting news clip from 2014 that recounts the tragedy. And now the country wants a return to its former glory. Here, a decade on, is that possible?

Know this, the world needs Australian robotics and Australian innovation. It’s a tragedy that the government let it wither. Can Australia now make a comeback?

Is Australian Robotics Making a Comeback?

Hi folks, and welcome once again to This Is Robotics: Radio News, Episode #20

For two years running now, we are the #1 Robotics News Podcast worldwide…and you my dear folks put us at #1. Thank you very much.

Thanks for joining us today

We’d really be remiss here at This Is Robotics if we didn’t put some sense into the biggest robotics story of the last several months. That story is of humanoid robots, bi-pedal humanoid robots hooking up with AI.

Our next story is called Humanoid Robots and AI Cross the Rubicon…together. The point of no return!

Where once people were frightened of humanoid robots taking jobs and more, they now seem to be frozen in fear over generative AI.

And with humanoid robots and AI converging, the spectre of a twin fear of humanoids high on AI running amok is scaring more than a few.

Let’s make some sense of what is really going on in this fast-paced world where the benefits from the convergence far outweigh the negatives.

Here also are two new articles courtesy of What’s New in Robotics, from our blog partnership with Robotiq, leader in automating work with easy-to-use cobot solutions.

The first one we call: Robots, needles & babies, which is about robotics disrupting infertility and in-vitro fertilization or artificial insemination, referred to as IVF.

Our second article from What’s New in Robotics story that we titled: Robot Lost & Found, which is the first-ever development of a robot designed to find lost items for dementia patients.

Our next story asks the question: Is India next up for an automation makeover? It appears so, and Indian robotics is rolling out to the launchpad to drive it all.

The Wall Street Journal, the International Federation of Robotics, and the International Monetary Fund are out with glowing reports on India’s upcoming successes.

The timing couldn’t be better.

See our companion articles in Asian Robotics Review:

Indian Robotics: Sometimes the Future Is Now

Asia-Pacific 70% of Global Growth 2023

Finally, in an interview with Simon Winchester, the historian looks at the precision engineering styles of Henry Ford and Henry Royce as he celebrates the unsung breed of engineers who through the ages have designed ever more creative and intricate machines. He takes us on a journey through the evolution of “precision,” which in his view is the major driver of what we experience as modern life.

Welcome everyone to This Is Robotics, Episode #21.  I’m Tom Green your host and fellow traveler in the wonderful world of robotics.

This is our first podcast while the world is hip deep in generativeAI. In fact, much of our show today is about AI and robotics.

 We lead off with our partnership blog What’s New in Robotics? with Robotiq, the automation company that helps you elevate your workforce with easy-to-use cobot solutions that do the work for you.

Two of our blog posts from What’s New in Robotics? talk about an “inflexion point” arriving in 2023 heralding exponential advances in AUTONOMY and ADAPTIVITY. Both advances are arriving simultaneously with gererativeAI, which should make for an interesting year.

Following that one of our main AI articles this episode: Does AI Need a Body?

GenerativeAI, say the experts, is limited while AI is disembodied, but give it a body… and whamo! With a body, AI explore the world on its own. Because of that, look for bi-pedal humanoid robots in 2023 to get a lot of attention from AI.

Casey Neistat had AI write a vlog script on places of interest in Manhattan. Casey shot the script, edited it, and then presented it on his YouTube channel. 

Here’s Casey’s take on AI as a scriptwriter:

Even Casey thinks something major is missing. Could it be a body?

Then we present a segment on cobots. Yes, cobots again! A segment we call Cobots Sing the Blues. What is going on with cobot sales? The cobot is one of the greatest advances in robotics, yet for nearly a decade now, it’s sales have been flaccid: less than 5% of total robot sales…and seemingly going nowhere fast. 

Our big question is are cobots chasing the wrong customer? We say, yes, and have for some time now. 

I personally love Elite cobots, which I think are the best out there; and I love what igus has done with the REbel for $7500. But there’s something missing, and we contend that it’s the right fit with the right customer. 

Our concluding section offers up and in-depth analysis of the cobot and how to fix sales: we call the segment: The Trouble with Cobots!

EXTRA: Download PDF version: The Trouble with Cobots

This summer of 2023 is one to particularly remember for robotics. We’ll remember 2023 for a long time, even as it spawns two more equally amazing and remarkable years to come 2024 and 2025. Robotics technology and sales will thunder into the quarter-century mark of this millennium’s first 100 years.

Today’s podcast looks at three bellwether happenings for robotics here in 2023…and the carryover for them through 2025.

Of course, leader of the bellwether gang is generative AI or genAI that bull-rushed the world this spring sowing fear, chaos, glee, elation…and even adulation as it blindly fast changed most everything around us…and continues to do so.

Then there was the rise of general-purpose robots and cobots. Oh my, these smart robots and cobots change everything and are the future of everything. Like Google and DeepMind’s RoboCat.

We’ll take a look at the RoboCat effect on robotics going forward. Plus, from a real-world look at smart robots in action, we’ll look at Lockheed’s use of smart robots. See how and why Lockheed got a 10x productivity bump. Are these smart critters the future? You bet.

Then another amazing happening in robotics: two countries, not just one, making a bid for greatness. In March there was Korea and its $177 billion dollar move into leadership in East Asia with all things AI and robotics.

We profiled Korea in a multi-series article set in March and then featured Korea in the March edition of the This Is Robotics podcast.

Next up, is our second pick for greatness. India. India’s time has come. Not only for robotics and automation but as a country that has enabled the extraordinary ascent of India’s indigenous robotics technology. The intertwined future of India’s economics and its robotics technology.

As economist Tyler Cowen put it: “With Rishi Sunak as prime minister of the U.K., it is now impossible to deny what has been evident for some while: Indian talent is revolutionizing the Western world far more than had been expected 10 or 15 years ago.”

And finally, from Gutenberg to GenAI. Why is it that humans will always reign supreme? I found out at 39,000 feet over the Pacific on my way to Asia… in the pages of a book from 2014 by Steven Johnson called How We Got to Now. Mother Nature did things to us in both brain and body that make us supreme. Sorry AI.

Article Set for Rise of Indian Robotics

Is Addverb Technologies the Big Bang of Indian Robotics?

Indian Robotics: Sometimes the Future Is Now

Can India Build a Homegrown, Indigenous Robot Industry to Rival China’s?

Top 10 Best Homegrown, Industrial Robot Builders in India

Hi folks, and welcome once again to This Is Robotics: Radio News, Episode #23

I’m Tom Green, your host and companion on this incredible journey called robotics.

For two years running now, we have been the #1 Robotics News Podcast worldwide…we’re up to over 100,000 fans, and you my dear folks put us at #1. Thank you very much.

And thanks for joining us today

It’s August, the harbinger of September,  and the 4th and final Quarter 4 for 2023. That year went fast! Maybe because it was such a rollicking year for GenAI converging with everything, especially robotics.

August observed National Kiss & Make Up Day. Did You? If not, and you’re still angry, indecisive, or ready to move on, we have a special segment that just may be of help. Sex Robots.

Could falling in love with a robot friend be such a bad thing?

Dr Helen Driscoll of the University of Sunderland says “The point is, people already fall in love with fictional characters, even if there is no chance to meet and interact with them.” How many humans readily let go of their emotions and fall in love with a character in a movie? Plenty!

And we’ve also had an Astro sighting. You know Astro, Amazon’s $1600 diminutive home robot that rolled into our lives in 2021, and then disappeared. Seems Astro is now fueling up with GenAI, which Amazon has named Burnham. It won’t be around for a few years, says Amazon. Which for any other product would surely mean the kiss of death.

But, the entire category of home robots has also disappeared. What’s with that?

There’s a potential forecast looming that says home robots are looking at a marketplace of $16 billion. If they ever show up!

We love Coming to America stories, and our Orangewood Labs article is just such a tale of fresh ideas and hard work washing up on our shores. Just goes to show that immigrants come to the U.S. with more than their suitcases. 

Orangewood is about three Indian guys who are on a mission to democratize robotics for the small manufacturer, which is a segment in dire need of automation.

Okay, let’s get on with the news.

Hi everyone and welcome to This Is Robotics, Episode 24. Thanks for joining us. I’m Tom Green your guide and companion for today’s journey into our global robotics news podcast.

Our first story explores the reasons for Why Is There So Little Automation in America?

As sci-fi writer William Gibson once remarked:  “The future is already here but it’s not evenly distributed.” Well, much the same can be said for automation in America. 

Why is it that only 5 out of 50 U.S. states get 77% of all industrial robots? Those states are Michigan, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Iowa, and Kansas. While the remaining 45 states average 175 industrial robots apiece. 

 Those are definitely places that are “underautomated”. Three recent reports explain why, and the whys are not good for America.

The reports also answer the question: Do robots take jobs? Yes, they do! For every one robot deployed in this 5-state region, 3.3 jobs are lost. The reports also tell us what happens to the health of those individuals who lose their jobs to an industrial robot. It can be unsurprisingly grim.

Death by Robots!

Facts: Yes, Robots Take Jobs and Lower Wages

This five-state region could well become a test zone—a laboratory, if you will—for America’s future in dealing with people, robots, artificial intelligence, job loss, retraining and reskilling. Perfect things in these 5 Robo Hubs, and then spread them out to the rest of the country.

We’ve been covering Korea’s robot $177 billion-dollar breakout all this year. See the links for Korea’s Major Growth Spurt in 2023 in our show notes. 

 Everything “robot” in Korea is getting max attention these days from the government, industry, and academia. Doosan is no exception. It’s going public and its cobots have an excellent shot at pushing themselves into being #1 worldwide. We take a look at Doosan and its upcoming IPO. 

And while we’re on the subject of cobots, what’s STILL up with them and their weaker-than-tepid sales? Arguably the most important technical advance in robotics in the last 50 years has got a problem: SALES! And it’s been a problem for a decade. We’ve got an answer or two as to why. Join us and see if you agree. 

As an added bonus, we are reprising in this podcast our episode clip and PDF download titled: The Problem with Cobots. It offers a nice perspective on cobots going forward and how Doosan could take the lead.

With Doosan’s new cobot venture, we may finally see cobot sales finally hit the mega-numbers that forecasters have been predicting for cobots for years.

 And finally, Agility Robotics is feeling very fertile these days and its new humanoid Digit is about to multiply. Join us for Agility’s shot at assembly-line humanoids. Maybe as many as 10,000 someday soon striding out soon out of the world’s first humanoid robot factory. A 70,000-square-foot-factory that Agility calls its RoboFab

REPRISE: The Problem with Cobots

Hi folks. And welcome.

Question: Is it okay with everyone if we talk about 2024? 

I know it’s still October of 2023, but so much is at the ready for 2024 now that it seems a shame not to give the upcoming new year some mega attention.

Okay, deal. Let’s do it.

Welcome again to This Is Robotics, episode #25, October of 2023. I’m Tom Green, your host and companion as we take a robotics look forward at the upcoming New Year of 2024.

The word in the air and on the streets for 2024 is LOGISTICS. Yes, warehouses large and small, especially the small ones, DCs, and last-mile micro-warehouses have been in the news lately. 

And if you go back a few months, all the way to Walmart’s big meeting, big things have been brewing for a while.

So, without more ado, Happy New Year 2024.

From the Walmart shareholders meeting back in May, it was announced that Walmart was going all-in for robots and automation for 42 distribution centers in the U.S. and Canada. 

The lucky vendor is Symbotic, who Walmart has been working with for 4 years.

That news got the juices flowing because a few months later SoftBank and the aforementioned Symbotic agreed to partner for a new offering called GreenBox to sell WaaS…Warehouse as a Service.

That was followed by SoftBank and its secretive Project R squirreling around for even more of this purported new $500 billion market.

Which was followed by old friend Amazon, rolling out its new automation giant, Sequoia.

Then, halfway around the world, India for 2024 will use logistics during the build-out of Grade A warehouses, as well as to use logistics for nation-building for the country as a whole. 

In fact, the Asian Century that was last seen in China, is on the move away from East Asia and about to take up residence in India. As the late Swedish scientist and demographer Hans Rosling said: “In the past, economic growth was driving demographics, and now it’s the other way around.” Demographics is driving economic growth. And nowhere is that more in evidence than in India. India, with over 36,000 warehouses, is going to have a very interesting 2024.

Then we have an announcement to make. This Is Robotics and its parent company Asian Robotics Review, have a new birth announcement to make. Our family this month is growing bigger. We are launching our newest website Robo AI News.com (roboainews.com), which will specialize in rounding up, sorting through, and artfully displaying the best news on robotics and artificial intelligence (AI). 

News that specifically heralds the convergence of robotics and AI…and our call to action for everyone in robotics with the ability to contribute to Get On Our Wall. Send us your best in the ongoing robotics/AI convergence and we’ll publish it…and promote it and you throughout our family of online publications. Here again is the link. Take a peek: Robo AI News.

The Asian Century: Emphasis, India

Welcome everyone to This Is Robotics, Episode #26 for November 2023.

Oh, and BTW: Thanks for making us the #1 Global Robotics News Podcast for TWO YEARS IN A ROW. I’m Tom Green, your guide and companion into the wide, wonderful world of robotics. Welcome.

It’s that time of year when we take a look at Time Magazine’s picks for its Global Top Inventions for the year. This year, 2023, there are 200 selections in 21 different categories. 

Robotics, as usual, has its very own category, category #18, but my oh my, robotics, now with its new partnership in convergence with AI, has it ever seeped its way into nearly every other category. 

We’ll take a look at Time’s picks, plus we’ll pull one out and showcase it. It’s an amazing 5-year-old developer called Shift Robotics, from Pittsburgh. Shift has taken robotics, AI, and automation and brought them into the shoe business. Footwear!

What caught my eye was its founder, Xunjie Zhang, and his 3-minute description of the company’s design process, the “ask it, research it, plan it, create it, test it, and improve it” of finding a problem and coming up with a solution. Beautifully clear thinking and execution. Then we’ll see what Wired’s Brent Rose thinks about the company during his visit.

Following that is our annual Homage to Pittsburgh. A segment that we run every Thanksgiving. The heartwarming story of Pittsburgh’s fall and rise on the wings of robotics, after 29 steel companies filed for bankruptcy and left the city in tatters. 

I usually do a preamble to our Homage to Pittsburgh segment, but this year we have a contributor providing us with one. Florian Pestoni, well-known in the robotics biz as co-founder and CEO of InOrbit, a cloud robotics platform, who is also a pizza fanatic and a great admirer of Pittsburgh. He just made a trip to Pittsburgh and jotted down his thoughts. We’ll share them with you.

Then we’ll take a look at our newest website: Robo AI News where we aggregate and curate the best in the convergence of robotics with AI; and we’ll look to you guys to Get On Our Wall at Robo AI News. We’ll show you how. It’s simple but powerful. Robo AI News is dedicated to the most interesting man in the world: Garry Mathiason: The Man Who Knew Way Before! More on Garry a bit later in the show.

Okay, let’s get on with the news.

Hi folks, welcome to This Is Robotics, and our last episode for 2023. Next up a wild and woolly 2024. We are already planning our January show. It’s forecast to be a fabulous for robotics, logistics and automation in general. 

Plus, it’s also the Year of the Dragon (2024)

The dragon, one of the luckiest and most powerful symbols offering prosperity, and good fortune throughout 2024. It is the perfect time for rejuvenated beginnings and setting the foundation for long-term success.

THE STATS ARE IN FOR 2023! 

Our podcast host just gave us the best-ever Christmas present from our listeners:

Once again, we are #1 worldwide for a robotics news podcast.

Across 12 time zones and 63 countries, This Is Robotics podcast was downloaded by over 3,000 fans per week!

Yearly, over 150,000 touchpoints with our listeners.

Every hour of every day 18 pairs of ears somewhere in the world seek us out for the very best news in robotics. Thank you so very much!

This closing episode for 2022, we highlight robots converging with artificial intelligence…in laboratories. Already making good headway, we look closely at what’s going on.

We’ll look at one fascinating woman’s brilliant insight on how best to discover a cure for our most intractable diseases, especially those without cures in neuroscience like ALS, Parkinson’s, and Alzheimer’s. 

How research is broken and how she’ll fix it. Hmmm, interesting. Her name, Alice Zhang, founder and CEO of Verge Genomics, and she just got $134 million to realize her brilliant insight.

We catch up with her at a lecture at Stanford where she explains it all.

Then we take a stab at answering a question we get all the time from our listening audience: How exactly do robots and AI work together in a laboratory to come up with miraculous discoveries as of late? 

We go to a lab in Liverpool UK where Andy Cooper explains it all.

Then, how are all these elements taking over the industry? And giving it a name like Pharma 4.0? We present a concise, little episode excerpt that explains it all.

Wow, that’s a lot of “explaining it all” but it’s all cool stuff.

We close out our show with one of our most favorite and memorable episode excerpts, one that we get a large call to repeat throughout the year. 

But, it just so happens to be a perfect Christmas story, so we retell it every December: It’s a story about China’s supreme leader Deng Xiaoping, without whom China would have no middle class or be the giant in robotics it is today. 

We call it China’s Christmas Miracle. A more heartwarming tale you can’t find anywhere.

SHOW NOTES ADDENDUM

Please see the show notes for more on the incurable disease that is ALS, including one very sad diary from a 31-year-old woman just diagnosed with ALS.

ALS, or amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, is a progressive neurodegenerative disease that affects nerve cells in the brain and spinal cord.

Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), formerly known as Lou Gehrig’s disease, is a neurological disorder that affects motor neurons, the nerve cells in the brain and spinal cord that control voluntary muscle movement and breathing.

 As motor neurons degenerate and die, they stop sending messages to the muscles, which causes the muscles to weaken, start to twitch (fasciculations), and waste away (atrophy). 

ALS is progressive. Eventually, in people with ALS, the brain loses its ability to initiate and control voluntary movements such as walking, talking, chewing and other functions, as well as breathing. 

One woman’s ALS diary:
“The foreshadowing of my death appeared on my right index finger when I was 31 years old (2013). Twitching of a finger while swimming.

“My husband David and I would run a half-triathlon, and after that big race, we would start trying to have a baby. I had my life all planned out.

“A parade of neurologists (five in total) ordered a barrage of diagnostic tests. The blood tests, MRIs, spinal tap, CT, nerve conduction study, and electromyography (EMG) all came back normal. The EMG was a painful test in which the doctor plunged needles into my flexed muscles. But at least it ruled out ALS.

“After two more EMGs and 3 more months of confusion and anxiety, they confirmed the devastating news. I had ALS. I was diagnosed in August 2014.

“For any muscle in your body to move, two main nerve connections must happen. First, when you think, ‘I want to take a step,’ your brain sends a message to your spinal cord through the upper motor neurons,” she explained. “The spinal cord then signals the appropriate muscles to flex via the lower motor neurons, long fibers that extend all the way to your glutes, thighs, knees, ankles, and toes.”

“The signaling process is so rapid,” she said, “that it seems instantaneous and unconscious — you’re just walking.”

“I had not understood how truly magnificent the human body was until that moment.

“Statistically speaking, I had 2 to 5 years to live. No treatment. No cure. No chance of recovery

“I learned about the brutality of the disease along with the rest. The idea that I would lose the ability to walk, talk, eat, move, and eventually breathe was like a horror movie coming to life.”

SHOULD BE NOTED that the current worldwide ALS incidence to be 1.9 per 100,000. If the projection is correct, the total number of worldwide ALS cases will increase to 376,674 in 2040.

Nearly all cases of ALS are considered sporadic, meaning the disease seems to occur at random with no clearly associated risk factors and no family history of the disease. Although family members of people with ALS are at an increased risk for the disease, the overall risk is very low, and most will not develop ALS.

Hi folks, welcome to This Is Robotics for February 2024, Episode #28. I’m Tom Green, your host and companion as we travel together through the big, wide world of modern robotics…and now, robotics is getting even better as it converges with artificial intelligence.

Ah, the age of smart robots is upon us.

Thanks again for making This Is Robotics the #1 robotics news podcast worldwide…for two years running. 

We did some investigative journalism this month to find out why…and we were surprised at what we found. You will be as well. An article series on the topic we published in Asian Robotics Review titled Why So Little Robot Automation in America? got over 10,000 hits. Our email response from our readership attested to the fact that we were not the only ones surprised by our findings. It’s accompanied by a news report from CBS which also covered the strange state of robotics in the U.S.

Then we’ll dip off into What’s New in Robotics? What’s New in Robotics? is the blog we write in partnership with Robotiq. 

From the blog, we present here at This Is Robotics three FIRST-EVERS in robotics. We love what people have been doing with robots and cobots lately.  Simply amazing!

Two of them hail from Korea: Hyundai’s micro-factory in Singapore; and a huge breakthrough by Koreans in teaching robots to respond to the human voice. Then we nip over to Argonne Laboratories to see cobots in a first-ever making medical radioisotopes. 

We close out the podcast with what is the biggest story in robotics for the foreseeable future: Can Robots Save East Asia?

China, Korea, & Japan are suffering from a new pandemic: Too Few Workers, Too Many Elderly, and Too Little Automation.

China, Korea, and Japan are plagued with the very same “too few, too many, and too little” affliction simultaneously.

The clock is ticking on China, Korea, and Japan. The five years 2025 to 2030 will be critical. Each country has a plan. What is each doing…and can each plan work?

We have been following this mega-story since 2023. Along with an in-depth article series on the subject in Asian Robotics Review, we brought the story into this month’s podcast as well. We’ll show you what we know. 

As always, look in the show notes for all the links to the online articles. 

Thanks for coming. We appreciate your attention and loyalty,