田豐 古點(diǎn) 楊屹東

ABSTRACT：They will be able to go where people can， but existing bots cannot.

THEY MIGHT appear cutesy， but a pair of robots that turned up recently at the Ford Motor Companys Van Dyke Transmission Plant， in Detroit， are practical working machines. They may， indeed， point to the future of automation. Putting robots into factories is hardly a new idea—some 2.4m of them are already at work in plants around world. But most of these are little more than giant arms， bolted firmly to the ground， that weld and paint things. Those few that have the mobility to manage tasks like delivering components do so by scooting along on wheels. The new devices at Van Dyke are rather different sorts of beasts. They can walk.

This pair of bright-yellow quadrupeds look a bit like dogs， prompting one to be nicknamed Fluffy and the other Spot （which latter moniker is also the official name given by Boston Dynamics， the American company that manufactures them， to this particular model of robot）. The pair are not there to amuse the factorys human workers， though， but rather to perform an important task that Ford hopes will save it a ton of money. With laser scanners mounted on their backs， Fluffy and Spot can scamper around the 200，000 square-metre plant collecting data. Those data will be employed to build a detailed computer model of the entire manufacturing operation. This sort of model is called a digital twin， and Fords engineers will use it to work out how to rearrange the production line to produce a new gearbox.

Over the years， factory plans get out of date as things are moved around and new equipment is brought in. Surveying the transmission plant by hand would take weeks and cost some $300，000. Ford reckons that Fluffy and Spot， which can both climb stairs and crawl into hard-to-reach areas， will cut the time required by half and complete the job for “a fraction of the cost.” Although Ford is leasing the robots， Boston Dynamics has now put them on sale for $75，000 a pop. At that price they would soon pay for themselves in tasks like the one being undertaken in Van Dyke.

The Spot range is the first of Boston Dynamicss walking robots to be commercialised. More such machines are starting to appear from other firms and research groups. Some are also quadrupeds. Others are bipedal. The two-legged sort can be more agile and， if equipped with arms as well， are better suited to tasks like picking things up or operating controls. What all of these machines have in common is that they represent—forgive the pun—a huge step forward in robot locomotion.