{"id":249501,"date":"2024-07-31T02:01:05","date_gmt":"2024-07-31T02:01:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/michigandigitalnews.com\/index.php\/2024\/07\/31\/this-vacuum-robot-dog-can-find-and-suck-up-trash-with-its-feet\/"},"modified":"2025-06-25T17:13:33","modified_gmt":"2025-06-25T17:13:33","slug":"this-vacuum-robot-dog-can-find-and-suck-up-trash-with-its-feet","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/michigandigitalnews.com\/index.php\/2024\/07\/31\/this-vacuum-robot-dog-can-find-and-suck-up-trash-with-its-feet\/","title":{"rendered":"This vacuum robot dog can find and suck up trash with its feet"},"content":{"rendered":"<p> [ad_1]<br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div>\n<p>Cigarette butts pose a huge risk to the world\u2019s oceans and can be a pain to clean up by hand especially on public spaces like beaches. A group of Italian scientists have built a quadruped robot that can identify litter and pick up the smaller bits with its leg mounted vacuums.<\/p>\n<p>VERO, the vacuum equipped quadruped robot, is a four-legged device designed to look for and clean up litter on a variety of terrains. VERO was designed and built by a team of researchers from the Dynamic Legged Systems lab at the Italian Institute of Technology in Genoa, according to <a data-i13n=\"elm:affiliate_link;sellerN:USA TODAY;elmt:;cpos:1;pos:1\" href=\"https:\/\/shopping.yahoo.com\/rdlw?merchantId=14bcaa59-fd9f-4864-a7d9-a27d287727bc&amp;siteId=us-engadget&amp;pageId=1p-autolink&amp;featureId=text-link&amp;merchantName=USA+TODAY&amp;custData=eyJzb3VyY2VOYW1lIjoiV2ViLURlc2t0b3AtVmVyaXpvbiIsImxhbmRpbmdVcmwiOiJodHRwczovL3d3dy51c2F0b2RheS5jb20vdmlkZW9zL3RlY2gvMjAyNC8wNy8zMC90cmFzaC1zdWNraW5nLXJvYm90LXVzZXMtYWktdG8taWRlbnRpZnktYW5kLXJlbW92ZS1jaWdhcmV0dGUtYnV0dHMvNzQ2MDI3OTkwMDcvIiwiY29udGVudFV1aWQiOiI0YzZjNjgzMS00ZTkxLTRjODYtOTkzYS04N2JjY2RkOGMyN2MifQ&amp;signature=AQAAAdPFIYXEJ-80s3oUbDZBuvXqO1rwlNvGJ9USAlrqqo1R&amp;gcReferrer=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.usatoday.com%2Fvideos%2Ftech%2F2024%2F07%2F30%2Ftrash-sucking-robot-uses-ai-to-identify-and-remove-cigarette-butts%2F74602799007%2F\" class=\"link  rapid-with-clickid etailiffa-link\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" data-ylk=\"slk:USA Today;elm:affiliate_link;sellerN:USA TODAY;elmt:;cpos:1;pos:1;itc:0;sec:content-canvas\"><em><\/em><\/a>.<\/p>\n<div class=\"caas-iframe-wrapper\" data-embed-anchor=\"9be24ec6-5a0c-58de-84d9-b6b7243188c1\">\n<div class=\"caas-iframe youtube\" style=\"padding-bottom:56%\" data-type=\"youtube\">\n<blockquote data-src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/O8BqvAe-moI?si=DOlyhcmkiM9wU2PB\"><p><noscript><iframe title=\"VERO: a Vacuum-cleaner-Equipped Quadruped RObot for Efficient Litter Removal\" width=\"1200\" height=\"675\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/O8BqvAe-moI?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/noscript><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p>The group published a paper back in April on VERO\u2019s development and effectiveness in the <a data-i13n=\"cpos:2;pos:1\" href=\"https:\/\/onlinelibrary.wiley.com\/doi\/abs\/10.1002\/rob.22350\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" data-ylk=\"slk:Journal of Field Robotics;cpos:2;pos:1;elm:context_link;itc:0;sec:content-canvas\" class=\"link \"><em><\/em><\/a>. The research paper states that cigarette butts are a serious concern. Discarded butts release toxic chemicals and microplastics into the ocean as they break down. It\u2019s also the \u201csecond most common undisposed waste worldwide, in terrains that are hard to reach for wheeled and tracked robots.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>VERO is designed for picking up this common type of small litter. An operator sets up a field target for the robot to traverse. Then it slowly walks the entire length of the target while identifying litter with a special neural network and onboard cameras. The quadruped robot has a \u201cconvolutional neural network for litter detection\u201d that can target litter and pick it up with one of four leg mounted vacuums, according to <a data-i13n=\"cpos:3;pos:1\" href=\"https:\/\/spectrum.ieee.org\/robot-dog-vacuum?fbclid=IwZXh0bgNhZW0CMTEAAR30yaYQzZCFdvDjaGTV9XBgMWS8GfTrb6VT3vdKVns-lE9t_7UgLQB56cI_aem_n9YMo6o0ORi9hqmiUvnFRg\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" data-ylk=\"slk:IEEE Spectrum;cpos:3;pos:1;elm:context_link;itc:0;sec:content-canvas\" class=\"link \"><em><\/em><\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Cleaning up beaches also can be a challenge because the sand makes it hard to lug wheeled trash bins or heavy receptacles over the terrain. The researchers conducted tests on \u201csix different outdoor\u201d scenarios to show VERO\u2019s proficiency at navigating difficult terrain. It can steady itself while picking up trash with an Intel RealSense depth camera mounted on its chin.<\/p>\n<p>The robot didn\u2019t get every piece of trash in its initial test but it still picked up 90 percent of the cigarette butts identified in testing. That\u2019s 90 percent less waste that ends up in the ocean.<\/p>\n<p>There don\u2019t seem to be any plans to implement VERO just yet. The researchers say VERO\u2019s design could be programmed and engineered to do other tasks like spraying crops, looking for weaknesses in infrastructure and helping with construction projects.<\/p>\n<p>This article contains affiliate links; if you click such a link and make a purchase, we may earn a commission.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p>[ad_2]<br \/>\n<br \/><a href=\"https:\/\/www.engadget.com\/this-vacuum-robot-dog-can-find-and-suck-up-trash-with-its-feet-203952526.html?src=rss\">Source link <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>[ad_1] Cigarette butts pose a huge risk to the world\u2019s oceans and can be a pain to clean up by hand especially on public spaces<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":249502,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[159],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/michigandigitalnews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/249501"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/michigandigitalnews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/michigandigitalnews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/michigandigitalnews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/michigandigitalnews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=249501"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/michigandigitalnews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/249501\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/michigandigitalnews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/249502"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/michigandigitalnews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=249501"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/michigandigitalnews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=249501"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/michigandigitalnews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=249501"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}