Robot gets sick, helps med students
I freaked out the first time Abe Lincoln broke down in the Hall of Presidents, and it took the better part of the day before the attraction was reopened. If good ol' Abe had been able to tell his maker what was wrong, my grasp of history might extend beyond April of 1865. Researchers at Gifu University have developed such a robot for medical students to help them better diagnose patients.
The fembot mimics human muscle movement and can exhibit symptoms of various ailments for med students to observe and examine. Not only have the researchers been able to develop a robot that acts sick, it can also respond verbally to questions about how it feels. While it doesn't have every disease programmed in, professors hope to add many more conditions and have it ready for the school's curriculum next year. No word if one of the ailments is, "Doctor it hurts when I do this."
