Emergency response: robots primed for disaster operations.

• Author: Jean, Grace V.
• Position: Science and Technology

SENDAI, Japan -- In a country where robots can waltz, karate-chop wood, play drums and conduct orchestras, perhaps it is not surprising that they may soon rescue humans trapped beneath the rubble of an earthquake.

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Scientists here at one of Japan's leading engineering universities are developing robotics technology and information systems that can help first responders track down victims in the aftermath of a natural disaster.

Earthquakes are a "really serious problem for our country," says Tohoku University professor Satoshi Tadokoro, two days after a 7.2 magnitude quake shook this city of 1 million people and a large portion of northeastern Honshu, Japan's main island.

Spurred to action by the 7.3 magnitude earthquake that rocked the city of Kobe in 1995 and killed 6,432 people, mechanical engineers and scientists across the nation are focusing their efforts on search-and-rescue robots.

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"No living person has been rescued by a robot. It will come true soon," says Tadokoro, who is president of the International Rescue System Institute, a non-profit organization promoting research and technology development for disaster relief

With government funds, the institute organized a five-year nationwide project to develop technologies for emergency responders conducting search-and-rescue operations in urban areas. More than 100 academic researchers participated in the effort.

Out of the initiative, the researchers produced ground and aerial vehicles, sensors and information and communications equipment.

Information gathering is the most critical issue in search and rescue, says Tadokoro. Studies that followed the 1995 Kobe earthquake showed that reconnaissance technologies are critical to being able to rapidly locate victims. Robotics technologies are particularly effective in this realm, he says.

"The robots should not be an intelligent system. They should be a good tool first, and the human responder makes the rescue," says Tadokoro.

Tracked ground vehicle robots have been used widely in the U.S. military for bomb disposal. These systems also are ideal for search and rescue. Tadokoro's laboratory developed a high-mobility tracked and wheeled robot named Kenaf that can climb steps and traverse 70-degree slopes of rubble. The six-motor wireless robot carries cameras and other sensors and is remotely operated with a joystick.

Last year, it beat iRobot's Packbot and Foster-Miller/Qinetiq North America's...