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WHAT'S NEW
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Home robots that clean up
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Find out how the latest high-tech cleaning tools can lighten your domestic load.
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By Dee Van Dyk
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For those who grew up watching Rosie the robot bustle around the Jetson's cartoon household, the future was friendly. It included an abundance of leisure time and a robotic maid who did the menial household chores. For some, it was a bit of a nasty surprise to reach adulthood and find that the real world held neither excessive leisure time nor domestic robots. Until recently.
Home robots are making their way into North American households and they offer a break from housework, come equipped with intelligent cleaning sensors and their technology is improving in clever ways.
"A lot of the early attempts at robotics were really for a humanoid robot that could do everything at once," says Nancy Dussault, director of global marketing for robot manufacturer iRobot. "That's just too expensive and too difficult."
But robot manufacturers mastered their home robots and now offer various models ranging in price from $150 to over $1,500.
How robots spare lives
iRobot made its mark in robotics by designing and building military robots that could go places people shouldn't, couldn't, or wouldn't want to. Those robots manoeuvred through dangerous Afghan caves, detected and defused bombs, and explored rubble from the collapse of the World Trade Centre in 2001.
All of these uses helped make iRobot's transition to home robots relatively simple. iRobot's first home robot, the vacuuming Roomba, was introduced in September 2002, using programming based on that of mine-clearing robots.
Robotic intelligence explained
Since its inception, the six-pound Roomba has become sophisticated enough to dock itself for a recharge when it's done vacuuming a room. The more advanced Roomba Scheduler ($399) can also be programmed to clean on a schedule so while you're at work, the robot vacuums at home.
"There's an added sensor that allows it to notice especially dirty areas so that it cleans longer," says Dussault. An infrared sensor keeps the Roomba from running off stairs, while allowing it to hug walls and scoot under furniture.
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