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Wednesday, October 23, 2013

“Frank”: World’s first complete bionic man

What is Frank (Frankenstein) ?
Screenshot_2Researchers from Zurich (Switzerland) have revealed the world’s first walking, talking bionic man called Frank, short for Frankenstein
Researchers have engineered the world’s first robot human or Bionic man made entirely of prosthetic parts. It can walk, talk and has a beating heart. The robot has been developed by Roboticists Rich Walker and Matthew Godden of Shadow Robot Co in England.
To develop the Bionic man, scientists assembled prosthetic body parts and artificial organs donated by laboratories around the world.
Key features of the complete Bionic Man Frank (Frankenstein):
  • 6 feet tall
  • Fully functioning circulatory system
  • Beating heart and lungs
  • 28 artificial body parts and synthetic organs.
  • Artificial organs including an artificial heart, blood, lungs (and windpipe), pancreas, spleen, kidney and functional circulatory system.
  • Fitted with a cochlear implant, speech recognition and speech production systems.
  • Equipped with a sophisticated chatbot  programme that can talk.
  • Robotic ankles and feet enable it to move
  • Face is made of silicone and is a replica of Dr Meyer’s
  • Fitted with 200 processors
  • 70 circuit boards and 26 individual motors
  • Wears a robotic exoskeleton dubbed Rex to support its prosthetics legs.
  • However, the robot human lacks a few organs including liver, stomach and intestines, which are too complex to replicate in a lab.
  • Brain can imitate certain functions of the human brain and has a retinal prosthesis.
  • Development cost: nearly $1 million.
  • Frank (short for Frankenstein) has been named after Victor Frankenstein in Mary Shelley’s 1818 novel

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