Robots and Physical Computing

Finally got around to building add playing with the Kitronik :Move  https://www.kitronik.co.uk/5624-move-mini-buggy-kit-excl-microbit.html  (see below - I decided to put the green sides on the outside - just to be different). One of its features is a vertical set of holes for a pen to be placed in. Add the blocks (found at  https://github.com/KitronikLtd/pxt-kitronik-servo-lite ) in blocks editor ( https://makecode.microbit.org/ )  to control the motors. You can do the same thing with writing to the pins,  t hose instructions come with the build instructions, but using the extra blocks  is a little easier to understand. Also add the package for neopixels (type in neopixels  in the search box to find them). Two very good tutorials I found useful to start with can be found at: Neopixels on the robot  in blocks - https://www.kitronik.co.uk/blog/using-kitronik-zip-leds-bbc-microbit/ Servos on the robot in blocks -  ht...

Use of evolutionary algorithms to select filters for evoked potential enhancement Scott Turner University of Leicester Published: 2000 http://hdl.handle.net/2381/29366 DOI: 10.13140/RG.2.1.3654.3204 Abstract Evoked potentials are electrical signals produced by the nervous system in response to a stimulus. In general these signals are noisy with a low signal to noise ratio. The aim was to investigate ways of extracting the evoked response within an evoked potential recording, achieving a similar signal to noise ratio as conventional averaging but with less repetitions per average. In this thesis, evolutionary algorithms were used in three ways to extract the evoked potentials from a noisy background. First, evolutionary algorithms selected the cut-off frequencies for a set of filters. A different filter or filter bank was produced for each data set. The noisy signal was passed through each filter in a bank of filters the filter bank output was a weighted sum of the individ...

I have recently taken two robots to a Code Club, here are a couple of reflections/observations. Cozmo This robot produced by Anki is incredibly cute - a cross between Wall-E and a pet in some respects. The code below was produced by the 'Code-Clubbers' and gets Cozmo to speak move around and operate its forks at the front. Anecdotally, someone was trying to work on something but couldn't resist coming and having another look at what it was doing. Ohbot Ohbot provided a different opportunity to play with a robot, getting to move the mouth, speak and track faces. My first impression was some of the children were a bit wary, until they found out they could control what it says and that seemed to break the ice. All opinions in this blog are the Author's and should not in any way be seen as reflecting the views of any organisation the Author has any association with. Twitter @scottturneruon