Proto-2 Humanoid Robot

Robots used to look cool and all, just look at robots like Robocop, Transformers and whatever. Now it seems the trend is to build robots that look creepy, rather than cool and robot-like. The folks over at Advanced Robotic Systems Laboratories (ARSL) are busy showing off their new Proto-2 robot, and it’s just as creepy as the robots that most people are coming up with nowadays. It is designed partly to aid in the study of human-robot interaction, and thus packs an expressive face, complete with moving eyebrows and a (more) natural walking gait, thanks to a new dynamic toe-joint that they developed. If this trend keeps up, we’re going to have to ask the folks we meet by the roadside in the future if they’re robots.