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For over 10 years, an itch on his nose had been annoying Henry Evans. Many take such basic functions for granted, but not Evans. When he was 40, a stroke left him paralysed and mute. He can only move his head and partially move one finger. Evans could finally scratch that itch last year, and what's more, even shave, with the help of PR2, his personal robotic helper. The robot is now starting to help Evans around the house, organising and fetching things. "The robot enables me to manipulate my physical environment.

It sounds like a plot straight out of the futuristic sitcom “The Jetsons” - robots that tend to and monitor patients recovering from surgery. But such a scenario is no longer science fiction. . . .Charlie Kemp, director of the Healthcare Robotics Lab at the Georgia Institute of Technology, said patients can expect these technologies to start popping up throughout the health care system as technology becomes less expensive and more refined, and telecommunications infrastructure more reliable. “Technology is maturing to the extent that it can make an impact on everyday lives,” Kemp said.

Two high school teams scoring first and second places in the BEST (Boosting Engineering Science and Technology) Georgia Robotics competition on Oct. 29, 2011, have something in common: Engineers from the Georgia Tech Research Institute (GTRI) serve as team mentors.
Principal Research Engineer Tom Collins helped mentor the Fernbank LINKS team from DeKalb County Schools to a first-place finish, while Research Engineer Bob Baggerman’s Grady High School team took second place. In 2010, the Grady High team took the overall top prize.

The IEEE Board of Directors, at its November 2011 meeting, has elected Professor Magnus Egerstedt (CoE, ECE) and Professor Irfan Essa (CoC, SIC) to IEEE Fellow grade effective 1 January 2012.
The IEEE Board of Directors elevated Professor Magnus Egerstedt to IEEE Fellow, with the following citation: for contributions to hybrid and networked control, with applications in robotics.
The IEEE Board of Directors elevated Professor Irfan Essa to IEEE Fellow, with the following citation: for contributions to computer vision and graphics.

Georgia Tech's College of Computing plans use a gift of nearly $1 million in robotics equipment to create a manufacturing robotics logistics laboratory on campus. The laboratory will allow faculty and students at the Institute's Robotics and Intelligent Machines Center to study the use of robotics in supply chain and fleet management.

Georgia Tech has been awarded a contract from the U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency to provide manufacturing education programs to high school students. The base development contract includes about $1 million for the first year, with the potential of $10 million over four years to expand the projects.

Welcome to the battlefield of the future. Malleable robots. Insect-size air forces. Chemical tracers spritzed from the sky. It's the stuff of science fiction. . . . At the Georgia Institute of Technology in Atlanta, Ronald Arkin is researching a stunning premise: whether robots can be created that treat humans on the battlefield better than human soldiers treat each other. He has pored over the first study of US soldiers returning from the Iraq war, a 2006 US Surgeon General's report that asked troops to evaluate their own ethical behavior and that of their comrades. . . .

Residents at Mount Macrina Manor, a long-term care facility in Uniontown, Pa., have many furry companions to keep them company: dogs, cats, bunnies, birds, and a couple of robotic white baby seals. Residents and staff call one of the seals Sarah, but to its manufacturers and researchers, it's known as Paro. Patti Benford, Mount Macrina's administrator, said therapists caring for patients with dementia use Paro to help them work through problems with communication and social interaction.

The National Science Foundation (NSF) has awarded $6 million to fund three projects involving researchers from the Georgia Institute of Technology. Each four-year, $2 million grant was awarded through the NSF's Division of Emerging Frontiers in Research and Innovation (EFRI).
"The EFRI research teams will probe some profound aspects of the interface of biology and engineering," said Sohi Rastegar, director of EFRI. "If they are successful, the principles and theories uncovered in their investigations could unlock many technological opportunities."

GTRI's Collaborative Unmanned Systems Technology Demonstrator (CUSTD) uses two small-scale aircraft and a full-size automobile to perform a complex, interactive mission without human intervention.