TR100 - 2003 Technology Review Magazine presents their third class of 100 innovators 35 or younger whose technologies are poised to make a dramatic impact on our world. Attached are innovators who have an interest in rehabilitation. Cynthia Breazeal - MIT Innovation: Constructs robots whose expressive faces convey humanlike emotions People often ask Cynthia Breazeal, director of the MIT Media Laboratory’s robotic-life group, whether robots will take over the world. "I’m like, ‘Oh, go see a movie,’" she laughs. Nonetheless, there’s something Hollywood about Breazeal’s work. She builds expressive robots that exhibit socially appropriate emotional responses, attracting media attention as well as advancing artificial-intelligence research. For her doctoral thesis, Breazeal constructed Kismet, a bright-eyed mechanical head that reacts to human voices, movements, and expressions with smiles, frowns, and raised eyebrows. Her latest robot, Leonardo, a collaboration with the Stan Winston Studio, of movie special-effects fame, is a 75-centimeter-tall creature. The furry bot’s 60 small motors produce fluid movements and subtle facial expressions; it also has pressure-sensitive "skin", microphones, a speech synthesizer, and camera "eyes" that track people’s faces and gestures. Unlike other robots, whose actions are driven by programmed routines, Leonardo learns tasks by assessing humans’ expressions and imitating their movements. Breazeal calls it "the most expressive robot today", and because she believes "socially intelligent" robots could become actors, or helpers for the elderly, she is conducting studies of human-robot interaction. Her lab is also helping NASA build a "robonaut" space assistant that might one day perform maintenance tasks in space. http://www.ai.mit.edu/people/cynthia/cynthia.html http://web.media.mit.edu/~cynthiab/ http://robotic.media.mit.edu/ http://www.ai.mit.edu/projects/humanoid-robotics-group/kismet/kismet.html http://www.samogden.com/Kismet_and_Cynthia_Breazea.html http://www.cogtech.org/CT99/Breazeal.htm http://www.2001halslegacy.com/interviews/braezeal.html http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/nr/2001/kismet.html http://www.siggraph.org/conferences/REPORTS/s2003/articles/robotics.html http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/2001/01/05/CC69735.DTL&type=tech_article --- Torsten Reil - NaturalMotion Innovation: Employs simulations of human movement to create realistically animated characters It might be surprising to find a biologist pushing the frontiers of computer animation. But Torsten Reil is bringing cheaper, lifelike digital characters to video games and films. As a doctoral researcher in neural systems at the University of Oxford, Reil programmed computer simulations that mimicked human and animal movement, and in 2001 he cofounded NaturalMotion in Oxford, England, to commercialize that work. To create characters that move realistically, conventional animators draw extensive series of frames that are played back - repetitively - in set sequences. But Reil wrote software that an animator uses to program a nervous system for a character he or she draws just once. The code makes the character's body obey the laws of physics and react automatically to changing on-screen situations. NaturalMotion's first product is already saving game developers and visual-effects companies thousands of dollars by accelerating animation, Reil says. Look for his characters in the upcoming Hollywood epic Troy. Reil recently won a grant from the British government to model the gaits of children with cerebral palsy, to help doctors determine the neurological basis of the disorder. http://users.ox.ac.uk/~quee0818/ http://www.naturalmotion.com/ http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/2058040.stm http://users.ox.ac.uk/~quee0818/pub/publications.html --- Erin Lavik - Yale University Innovation: Helped paralyzed rats walk again and aims to do the same for people A playwright who has written a one-act farce, Erin Lavik has a day job that is no laughing matter. She uses polymers and neural stem cells to promote recovery from spinal-cord injuries, which 10,000 people suffer each year in the United States alone. A Yale University assistant professor of biomedical engineering, Lavik designed polymer scaffolds that mimic the architecture of a healthy spinal cord, seeded the scaffolds with neural stem cells, and implanted them in paralyzed rats. Much to everyone's surprise, the rats were able to move their limbs, bear weight, and even walk. Although spinal-cord-injury research is a big field, Lavik's method is the first to demonstrate such dramatic success. Repairing spinal-cord injuries in humans will be a bigger challenge, but then, Lavik didn't expect her injured rats to walk so soon. If she has her way, people with spinal-cord injuries could be walking sooner than expected, too. http://www.eng.yale.edu/faculty/vita/lavik.htm --- Tsuyoshi Yamamoto - Hitachi Innovation: Builds brain-imaging machines that are faster and cheaper than magnetic-resonance imaging equipment Tsuyoshi Yamamoto is steering his way through the brain. Since joining Hitachi's Advanced Research Laboratory in Hatoyama, Japan, in 1997, he has co-developed an optical-topography system that measures changes of concentrations of hemoglobin in the brain, providing insight into how neurons process language, images, and movement. Yamamoto's device, which is easier to use and cheaper than magnetic-resonance imaging (MRI), beams light through the skull and into the cortex, the brain's outer layer. By charting the intensity of the light reflected back by the cortex, the machine gauges changes in blood cell concentrations - indications of brain activity. The instrument, which looks like a beauty salon dryer, is less motion sensitive than MRI equipment, so rather than lying flat, patients are seated for scans. Now on sale in Japan, the system has received US Food and Drug Administration approval. Patients robbed of muscle control by neurodegenerative disease can communicate via Yamamoto’s gear, which can sense the brain’s "yes" and "no" responses to questions. He hopes his device will further understanding of language processes. "We don't know so much about the brain," he says. "I would like to find new functional areas." http://aoot.osa.org/abstract.cfm?id=72463