With multiple robotics courses now being offered and a new robotics lab slated to open this year, Michigan Technological University's College of Computing is introducing Balto the robot dog to the campus community.
Balto, named for the legendary husky and lead sled dog who ran the last leg of a more than 500-mile dog sled relay to deliver diphtheria antitoxin to Nome, Alaska, in 1925, will be the greeter in Michigan Tech's new robotics lab, coming to Rekhi Hall.
About the Researcher
As plans for the facility come together, Balto has been paying visits to students around campus. Michael Walker, assistant professor of computer science, leads the demonstrations.
Walker said choosing the Balto moniker came easily. "Being named after a Husky is of course fitting, while also capturing some of Michigan Tech's essence of resilience and dedication that's embodied by students and faculty up here in Houghton," he said.
Walker, whose research focuses on human-robot interactions, said the state-of-the-art Boston Dynamics quadruped and manipulation platform Spot — now known as Balto — is well-suited to his special interest in improving human-robot teaming in real-world scenarios with immersive interfaces, including mixed or virtual reality.
"To enable exploration of this research space, the need rose for a robust robotic platform capable of working in complex indoor and outdoor environments," Walker said. "The goal is to not just explore and navigate these environments but be able to interact physically with them."
Balto's meet-and-greets serve an important introductory purpose.
"The demos showcase the capabilities of the cutting-edge industrial robot assets available to students at Tech while also bringing awareness to the MTU community about the activity, opportunities and growth within the Computer Science Department in terms of robotics research and courses," said Walker.
There are bigger plans for Balto beyond welcoming visitors to the Robotics Lab.
"Balto will be participating in research that explores teaming between human teleoperators and on-the-ground human team members in first response scenarios," said Walker.
Though Balto runs solo for now, there are plans for that to change. Additional ambassadors and assets will be coming to the robotics lab.
"The lab will house industrial-grade motion capture cameras and other robotic platforms including swarms of mobile aerial and ground robots, and a large, socially expressive humanoid robot designed for manipulation tasks that's coming to Tech next semester," said Walker.
Huskies can look forward to meeting the next new robot in the near future.
Michigan Technological University is an R1 public research university founded in 1885 in Houghton, and is home to nearly 7,500 students from more than 60 countries around the world. Consistently ranked among the best universities in the country for return on investment, Michigan's flagship technological university offers more than 120 undergraduate and graduate degree programs in science and technology, engineering, computing, forestry, business, health professions, humanities, mathematics, social sciences, and the arts. The rural campus is situated just miles from Lake Superior in Michigan's Upper Peninsula, offering year-round opportunities for outdoor adventure.
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