When the 3D animation studio Pixar and Disney released the full length feature Wall-E, it touched many people’s hearts. After all, what’s not to love with a robot which was designed to clean a waste-filled Earth but ultimately decides to follow his own heart to pursue his loved robot EVE? Apparently, it didn’t only touched people; it moved some brilliant minds to think that such a robot is possible.
So we’ll introduce or refresh your memory with the DustCart, a brain child of a group of young students from a nearby university in Pisa, Italy. DustCart is essentially Wall-E – or his earlier programming. It is a prototype of a robot which will try to bring a new dimension to the realm of garbage collecting in a small Italian town of Peccioli.
So here’s how DustCart works: if you have trash you just call DustCart as though he was your friendly neighborhood superhero but you’ll just hand out your trash to him. You have to possess a certain type of bonding or connection with DustCart. The robot would not grant your stinky request if you don’t have a username or a password even.
Yes, it’s like a forum when it comes to DustCart; you have to sign up.
But if you live in the same neighborhood, there will be not much loss for you to have an adorable robot to pick up your trash.
As expected of robots, the artificial intelligence of DustCart can keep up with the best the field of robotics can offer. It will ask you what type of garbage you will deposit. Is it organic, non-biodegradable, chemical or all of the above?
You have to be very clear when you give your trash. Segregation is one of the most important values of DustCart.
“The main benefit we expect for both service provider and citizens,” said Paolo Dario, a soft-spoken scientist who heads the Robotics Department at the Scuola Superiore Sant’Anna University, “is the fact that this service is available on demand.”
But wait there’s more. There is much premium on multi-tasking nowadays and robots will do best to follow with this trend. And indeed Dustcart does. Apart from being your handy garbage collector when you’re not feeling it or are just plain lazy, DustCart can do the entire community a favor by detecting the dilution levels of the air we breathe.
“A fleet of DustCarts could send precise data on the air we breathe, in real time,” said Barbara Mazzolai, DustCart Project Manager.
Of course, it will only indicate the status of the air for pollutants such as benzene and the rest of the gang. It may be asking too much of the DustCart to solve the air pollution problem as well. (But who knows?). Still, the point here is that people should not let machines do everything they are supposed to do. Or we’ll get a dose of Terminator: Salvation.
DustCart is part of a project called “DustBot,” a $3.9 million research program that started in 2006 to implement robotics in society in useful ways, such as cleaning the streets. So there’s promise here but the technology is still a bit raw – and only countries with a solid economy may be able to implement this. But it remains interesting how such a concept from an animated movie transcend into real life. Here is to hoping we get more of these real-life adaptations of fiction. What could be next? A real-life home levitated by balloons? Talking cars? The next great idea just may come out from your brain. So keep watching and keep thinking.
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