Boston Dynamics gives Atlas a new 13-joint hand, drops the pinky
The redesigned Atlas hand has a thumb and three fingers, doubles the joints from 7 to 13, and can hold power tools.
Boston Dynamics gave its Atlas robot a new hand with a thumb and three fingers. It can bend in more ways than the old one and can hold tools like drills. The pinky was dropped because it was not worth the extra work.
Hype check
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Why it matters
Hands decide what a humanoid can actually do. This one is built for factory work and mass production, not to look human.
Watch: robots do not need hands that look like ours.
The details
- The hand has 13 degrees of freedom, up from 7 on earlier versions.
- It has a thumb with 4 degrees of freedom and three fingers with 3 each; the pinky was cut.
- Boston Dynamics says it can hold triggered tools such as drills, grinders, nail guns and welding torches.
- It is designed for mass manufacturing and for training in simulation.
- The robot team says adding a pinky was not worth the extra complexity.
Receipts
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