Latest Advance in Robotics – Folding Towels!

July 19, 2010 The Bay Citizen

Humans can fold complex origami, but for a UC Berkeley robot, folding laundry is revolutionary 

In a massive breakthrough, a UC Berkeley scientist has built a robot that can … fold a dish towel.

Since Dr. Pieter Abbeel first posted a video of his team’s PR2 robot folding towels on YouTube in March, over a half million viewers have watched the industrious robot pick up, smooth out, fold and stack a messy pile of towels.

Although fascinating to watch, it’s hard not to be underwhelmed. Folding? A towel? Human origami experts can make a snake with 1,000 scales folded out of a single piece of paper! They can fold 3-D tessellations that would make M.C. Escher cross-eyed!

Hasn’t robotics advanced beyond the laundry room yet? ... (more)

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