Table of Contents
Designing robots involves understanding core principles and applying practical techniques to create functional and efficient machines. This multidisciplinary process requires knowledge of mechanics, electronics, programming, and systems integration. Robots are notoriously difficult to design because of complex interdependencies between their physical structure, sensory and motor layouts, and behavior. Proper planning and adherence to fundamental concepts are essential for successful robot design that meets real-world application requirements.
Understanding the Fundamentals of Robot Design
Robotics design is a multidisciplinary field that requires a deep understanding of mechanical, electrical, and software engineering. The foundation of any successful robot begins with clearly defining its purpose and operational requirements. Before diving into technical specifications, engineers must identify the specific tasks the robot will perform, the environment in which it will operate, and the performance characteristics required for success.
Defining Purpose and Application
Effective robotics design starts with a clear understanding of the robot’s purpose and application. Before starting the design process, it is essential to define the robot’s purpose and application. This involves identifying the tasks the robot will perform, the environment it will operate in, and the required performance characteristics. A clear understanding of the robot’s purpose and application helps to guide the design process and ensures that the final product meets the required specifications. This foundational step prevents over-engineering and ensures that development efforts focus on features that deliver measurable value.
Every robotics project starts with clearly understanding the problem the robot is solving. Whether the goal is navigating extreme terrain, performing delicate surgical tasks, or handling repetitive manufacturing operations, Boston Engineering begins each engagement with in-depth discovery to: … By anchoring the design process in real-world application needs, we avoid over-engineering and prioritize features that deliver measurable value. This approach helps teams allocate resources efficiently and develop solutions that address actual needs rather than theoretical capabilities.
Core Design Principles
Several fundamental principles guide effective robot design. These principles ensure that the final product is efficient, reliable, and capable of performing its intended functions consistently. Engineers must consider stability, mobility, payload capacity, and the selection of appropriate materials and components to ensure durability and performance.
Optimizing the design for efficiency and reliability is crucial in robotics. A well-designed robot minimizes energy consumption, reduces wear and tear, and ensures consistent performance. This optimization process involves careful analysis of power requirements, weight distribution, structural integrity, and component selection to create a balanced system that performs reliably over extended periods.
The Engineering Design Process for Robotics
The Engineering Design Process is a fluid series of steps used to streamline and maximize the efficiency of progress designing, building, and testing a robot. This systematic approach provides structure and organization to what can otherwise become an overwhelming task. Understanding and following this process helps teams avoid common pitfalls and develop more effective solutions.
Iterative Development Methodology
This process is iterative, meaning that the steps are repeated as many times as needed, making improvements along the way, learning from failure as new design possibilities are uncovered to arrive at great solutions. The Engineering Design Process can, and should, be used for all work on the robot, no matter the size. This iterative nature allows teams to refine their designs continuously, incorporating lessons learned from testing and real-world application.
The design process typically includes several key phases: problem definition, research and brainstorming, concept development, solution selection, prototyping, testing, and refinement. Each phase builds upon the previous one, creating a comprehensive framework for robot development.
Prototyping and Testing
Prototyping and testing are essential in robotics design. Prototyping allows designers to test and validate the design, identify areas for improvement, and iterate on the design. The prototyping phase enables teams to identify potential issues before committing to full-scale production, saving time and resources.
The key with prototyping is always the ability to iterate quickly. Spending your time fully developing the model is often not worth it. Rapid prototyping techniques allow engineers to test multiple concepts efficiently, gathering data that informs design decisions without excessive time investment in any single approach.
When testing, recording both qualitative data, such as whether or not the robot can score, and quantitative data, such as whether the robot functions consistently, helps to recognize any failure points or inconsistencies to refine. Ideally, repeat this step until every recorded data-point is optimal. Comprehensive testing protocols ensure that robots perform reliably under various conditions and meet all specified requirements.
Essential Components and Systems Integration
Modern robots consist of multiple interconnected systems that must work together seamlessly to achieve desired functionality. Understanding each component’s role and how they integrate is crucial for successful robot design.
Motors and Actuators
Motors and actuators provide the movement and actuation necessary for robots to perform physical tasks. Making robots move is a crucial part of robotics design. This is where designing mechanisms, or mechanical engineering, comes in. While mechanical engineering speaks more broadly to machine design, robot designers will be specifically focused on motors and gears, and how to best use them to get the motion desired from their robots.
The selection of motors depends on several factors including torque requirements, speed, precision, power consumption, and cost. Common motor types include DC motors for simple continuous rotation, servo motors for precise position control, and stepper motors for applications requiring exact angular positioning. Engineers must carefully match motor specifications to the robot’s performance requirements while considering weight, size, and power constraints.
Sensors and Perception Systems
A robot’s performance is fundamentally linked to its ability to perceive and interpret its environment accurately. Advanced sensor integration, using technologies such as LiDAR, ultrasonic sensors, cameras, and tactile sensors, forms the backbone of robotic perception systems. These sensors enable robots to gather information about their surroundings, detect obstacles, measure distances, and make informed decisions.
These sensory systems must operate in tandem with sophisticated sensor fusion algorithms, which combine data from multiple sources to create a comprehensive understanding of the environment. This is particularly crucial for autonomous robots navigating unstructured environments, such as self-driving cars or drones, where real-time object recognition and obstacle avoidance are essential. Effective sensor integration requires careful consideration of data processing capabilities, response times, and reliability under various environmental conditions.
Control Systems and Processing
Controllers manage operations and coordinate all robot components, serving as the central nervous system of the robotic platform. An understanding of electronics and microcontrollers (such as Arduino or Raspberry Pi) will allow you to make the right choices in motors, components and power for the robot being designed. The control system processes sensor data, executes programmed instructions, and sends commands to actuators and other subsystems.
Once the electronics are in place, the microprocessor or microcontroller system must be programmed to know how to act and interface with the surrounding world. While microcontrollers are generally used for more repetitive tasks, microprocessors enable advanced tasks such as image processing, artificial intelligence, mapping, and path planning. The top robotic programming languages are C/C++ and Python and are used to do everything from the motor function of a robotic arm to AI functionality.
Power Supply Systems
Power consumption is a critical component of any electromechanical system that must be considered at the very start of the design. The selection of all electronic and electrical components must always consider the system’s overall power requirements. Inadequate power systems lead to component failures and unreliable operation, while oversized power systems waste resources and add unnecessary weight and cost.
Power supply design involves selecting appropriate battery technologies, voltage regulators, power distribution systems, and backup power solutions. Engineers must calculate total power consumption across all systems, account for peak demand periods, and ensure sufficient capacity for the robot’s intended operational duration. Energy efficiency optimization through component selection and intelligent power management extends operational time and reduces overall system costs.
Structural Frame and Mechanical Design
The structural frame supports all components and maintains stability throughout operation. The selection of materials and components is critical in robotics design. The choice of materials and components affects the robot’s performance, reliability, and cost. Designers must balance the need for high-performance materials and components with the need to minimize cost. A thorough analysis of the robot’s requirements and constraints helps to identify the optimal materials and components for the application.
Material selection depends on factors including strength-to-weight ratio, durability, cost, manufacturability, and environmental resistance. Common materials include aluminum for lightweight applications, steel for high-strength requirements, and various plastics and composites for specialized needs. The structural design must accommodate all components while maintaining appropriate weight distribution and center of gravity for stable operation.
Modularity and Scalability in Robot Design
Modularity has emerged as a pivotal principle in robot design, allowing engineers to develop systems that can be easily reconfigured, upgraded, or repaired. This architectural approach provides significant advantages in terms of maintenance, adaptability, and long-term value.
Benefits of Modular Architecture
This architecture promotes scalability and versatility, particularly in industries like manufacturing, where robots need to adapt to changing production demands. In industries such as manufacturing and logistics, where operational environments are constantly evolving, modularity plays a crucial role in ensuring that robots can quickly adapt to new requirements, improving overall efficiency and reducing downtime.
Modularity in these systems facilitates scalability and enhances maintainability, allowing individual components to be replaced without the need for costly system overhauls. This approach reduces total cost of ownership and extends the useful life of robotic systems by enabling incremental upgrades rather than complete replacements.
Design for Manufacturability
Design for manufacturability (DFM) is a critical aspect of robotics design. DFM involves designing the robot and its components with manufacturability in mind, minimizing the complexity and cost of production. Designers can apply DFM principles by simplifying the design, reducing the number of components, and using standard parts. This approach streamlines production processes, reduces manufacturing errors, and lowers overall costs.
Implementing DFM principles requires collaboration between design engineers and manufacturing teams from the earliest stages of development. This ensures that designs are not only functionally effective but also practical to produce at scale with consistent quality.
Environmental Considerations and Operating Conditions
Robotics designs must also take into account the operating environment. The conditions in which a robot operates significantly impact design decisions regarding materials, sealing, thermal management, and component protection.
Harsh Environment Design
Many robotics projects must operate in harsh, variable, or unpredictable environments. From deep-sea robotics to cleanroom automation, our designs consider: Material resilience against corrosion, pressure, and temperature extremes … Robots deployed in challenging environments require specialized design considerations to ensure reliable operation.
The circuit board assemblies used in industrial robotics have to meet the highest reliability standards to ensure maximum uptime, with standards meeting or exceeding IPC Class 3. For cable assemblies and connectors, ruggedized connectors are available that are built specifically to withstand these environmental challenges. From a mechanical perspective, examples include over molded and locking connectors that can withstand mechanical vibration or shocks. As the most common contaminants in an industrial environment are moisture or dust, rugged electrical connectors should be sealed to meet IP67/IP68 requirements.
Terrain and Mobility Considerations
This includes everything that will impact the design of the robot: The environment it will traverse, the power needed to move, the senses it needs to perform desired tasks, the materials to make the body/chassis and the overall aesthetic style. Understanding the operational terrain helps engineers select appropriate locomotion systems, whether wheels, tracks, legs, or specialized mechanisms.
Different terrains present unique challenges. Smooth indoor surfaces allow for simple wheeled designs, while outdoor environments with uneven terrain may require tracked systems or legged robots. Aquatic environments demand waterproof enclosures and specialized propulsion systems, while aerial robots must optimize for weight and aerodynamics.
Design Tools and Technologies
Computer-aided design (CAD) software is a critical tool in robotics design. CAD software enables designers to create detailed models of the robot and its components, simulate the robot’s performance, and test the design. Other design tools, such as computer-aided engineering (CAE) software and simulation tools, are also used to analyze and optimize the design.
Simulation and Modeling
Prototyping and simulation via CAD tools are often required for an optimal design. Simulation environments allow engineers to test robot behavior, validate control algorithms, and identify potential issues before physical prototyping. This reduces development time and costs while improving final design quality.
Modern simulation tools can model complex physics including dynamics, collisions, sensor behavior, and environmental interactions. These capabilities enable comprehensive testing of robot designs in virtual environments that closely approximate real-world conditions. Engineers can iterate rapidly on designs, testing multiple configurations and scenarios without the expense and time required for physical prototypes.
Component Selection and Integration
Striking the right balance between custom components and Commercial Off-The-Shelf (COTS) parts is essential for managing cost, development time, and risk. Our team has extensive experience: Selecting and integrating COTS systems like sensors, controllers, and mobility modules · Designing custom actuators, frames, and enclosures to meet specialized performance needs · Validating interoperability through advanced modeling and simulation tools like MATLAB and SolidWorks ·
You should choose the hardware and software that best suit your needs, budget, and skills, and that are compatible and interoperable with each other. Careful component selection ensures that all systems work together effectively while meeting performance requirements and budget constraints.
Safety and Human-Robot Interaction
Modern robotics systems are increasingly collaborative and safety-critical. Boston Engineering integrates safety directly into the system architecture with: Emergency stops, force-limiting actuators, and redundant systems · Health-monitoring sensors and predictive analytics to detect wear before failures occur · Feedback loops that alert operators or autonomous systems to take corrective action ·
Collaborative Robot Design
Robots need to do more than solve narrowly defined problems like ‘move these orders to the shipping area.’ Instead, we need to design for the broader challenge of making human-robot collaborations efficient, effective and engaging. Collaborative robots, or cobots, work alongside humans and require special design considerations to ensure safe interaction.
Safety features for collaborative robots include force and torque limiting to prevent injury during contact, rounded edges and soft materials to minimize impact severity, and advanced sensing systems that detect human presence and adjust robot behavior accordingly. These design elements enable robots to work safely in shared spaces without traditional safety barriers.
Safety Standards and Compliance
There are some key standards for certain types of robots and these standards have some regulatory backing, so if your robot is operating in certain environments and is going to be sold on the market, make sure you are in compliance from the first design. For robotic arms, the key standard to follow is ISO 10218 with the US equivalent being ANSI R15.06. Both of these standards have a Part 1 and a Part 2. Part 1 applies to the manufacturer of the arm and one needs to be in compliance if one wants to get the CE mark for sale within the EU. Part 2 applies to integrators and will be a focus on agencies like OSHA if there is an incident.
Compliance with safety standards must be integrated into the design process from the beginning rather than added as an afterthought. This ensures that safety features are fundamental to the robot’s architecture and operation rather than superficial additions that may be inadequate or easily bypassed.
Advanced Design Considerations
Weight Distribution and Balance
Another common tradeoff consideration is the weight and shape of the system. How much will the robot weigh, and is there a weight restriction? Is there a limit to the robot’s size (especially height)? If it’s too tall, will it be unstable as it turns a corner during motion? Proper weight distribution ensures stability during operation and prevents tipping or loss of control.
Engineers must calculate the center of gravity for various robot configurations and operational states. This includes accounting for payload variations, arm positions, and dynamic forces during movement. Maintaining stability requires careful placement of heavy components like batteries and motors, often positioning them low in the structure to lower the overall center of gravity.
Miniaturization Trends
A big trend in electromechanical systems is miniaturizing all electric/electrical and mechanical components. The shrinking size of chips has enabled the miniaturization of boards and other systems, which is why smartphones, wearables, and even automotive vehicles have become smaller and more compact. Mechanical miniaturization has resulted in small actuators, gears, and motors—some so small they can easily fit inside the human body. The benefits of miniaturization are being enjoyed across many different fields of application, from sensors, wearables, and medical devices to satellites, drones, and even video games.
Miniaturization enables new applications and improves portability, but also presents challenges in terms of power density, heat dissipation, and manufacturing precision. Designers must balance the benefits of smaller size against potential limitations in performance, durability, and cost.
Soft Robotics and Emerging Technologies
Novel technologies, fabrication methods, controllers and computational methods are rapidly advancing the capabilities of soft robotics. This is creating the need for design techniques and methodologies that are suited for the multi-disciplinary nature of soft robotics. Soft robotics represents an emerging field that uses compliant materials and structures to create robots with unique capabilities.
Applications and Advantages
Soft robotics has introduced a range of robotic technologies with wide ranging form, function and appearance, with their inherent compliance opening up new application domains for robotics and leading to the creation of novel fundamental technologies. To date, soft robots have been successful applied to underwater exploration, rehabilitation robotics and manipulation solutions amongst others.
The compliance of soft robots provides advantages in applications requiring safe human interaction, adaptability to irregular objects, and operation in confined or delicate environments. These characteristics make soft robotics particularly valuable for medical applications, food handling, and exploration in unpredictable environments.
Design Challenges
This means that soft robot design relies heavily on human intuition and experience. Although this has been shown to lead to many successful and impact robotic solutions and approaches, these can be challenging to formalize the fundamentals that underpin the development of soft robotic technologies and solutions. The unique properties of soft materials and mechanisms require specialized design approaches that differ significantly from traditional rigid robotics.
Practical Design Tips and Best Practices
Start with Clear Requirements
It requires careful planning, testing, and refinement of the hardware and software components. Beginning with well-defined requirements prevents scope creep and ensures that design efforts remain focused on essential functionality. Document all requirements including performance specifications, environmental conditions, safety requirements, and budget constraints.
Requirements should be specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, and time-bound. Vague requirements lead to misunderstandings, wasted effort, and designs that fail to meet user needs. Engage stakeholders early to ensure that requirements accurately reflect actual needs and constraints.
Embrace Iteration and Continuous Improvement
The third, and by far the most important step in mechanism design, is iteration. A mechanism is never done. Even after it works, there are always things that could be improved on it. The design process constantly repeats itself. After testing the mechanism, identify areas of improvement, develop more concepts for how to solve the challenges, and start the process again from the beginning.
Successful robot design requires accepting that initial designs will have flaws and that improvement comes through systematic testing and refinement. Create a culture that views failures as learning opportunities rather than setbacks. Document lessons learned from each iteration to build institutional knowledge and avoid repeating mistakes.
Documentation and Knowledge Management
You should also document your results and use them to improve your design. Comprehensive documentation serves multiple purposes: it provides a reference for future modifications, facilitates knowledge transfer to new team members, supports troubleshooting efforts, and creates a record of design decisions and their rationale.
Documentation should include design specifications, component datasheets, wiring diagrams, software code with comments, test results, and design decision rationale. Maintain version control for all design files and code to track changes over time and enable rollback if needed.
Balance Complexity and Functionality
Avoid the temptation to add unnecessary features or complexity to robot designs. Each additional component or capability increases cost, weight, power consumption, and potential failure points. Focus on core functionality that directly supports the robot’s primary purpose, adding advanced features only when they provide clear value.
Simple designs are generally more reliable, easier to maintain, and less expensive to produce than complex ones. When faced with design choices, favor simplicity unless complexity provides demonstrable benefits that justify the added costs and risks.
Consider the Entire Lifecycle
Design decisions should account for the robot’s entire lifecycle including development, manufacturing, deployment, operation, maintenance, and eventual decommissioning. Consider how the robot will be assembled, calibrated, transported, installed, operated, serviced, and upgraded throughout its useful life.
Design features that facilitate maintenance include modular construction for easy component replacement, accessible test points for diagnostics, clear labeling of components and connections, and documentation of maintenance procedures. Planning for the full lifecycle reduces total cost of ownership and extends the robot’s useful life.
Testing and Validation Strategies
Comprehensive Testing Protocols
As building and programming work progresses, and the design begins to take shape, you will automatically carry out tests on the design. You will also need to complete systems tests at various stages of the construction. If any of the tests show that you have failure in a joint, or that part of your structure is not meeting specifications, then you will have to make modifications in your plan. When building and programming is complete, the entire project must be tested to see if it does the job for which it was designed.
Testing should occur at multiple levels: component testing to verify individual parts meet specifications, subsystem testing to ensure groups of components work together correctly, and system testing to validate overall robot performance. Each level of testing identifies different types of issues and contributes to overall system reliability.
Performance Evaluation
An evaluation needs to then be written. This should be a statement outlining the strengths and weaknesses in your design. It should describe where you have succeeded and where you have failed to achieve the aims set out in the specifications. Honest evaluation of robot performance against requirements identifies areas for improvement and validates design decisions.
Performance metrics should align with the robot’s intended application and may include speed, accuracy, repeatability, energy efficiency, payload capacity, operating time, and reliability. Establish baseline performance measurements early in development to track improvements through successive iterations.
Industry-Specific Design Considerations
Industrial Robotics
One of the most fundamental robot design considerations is the specific fabrication and/or assembly task to be performed. This determines both the components to be selected–particularly the end effector/manipulator–and also the type of robot to be designed. Industrial robots must meet rigorous reliability and performance standards to justify their investment and maintain production schedules.
Industrial applications often require robots to operate continuously for extended periods with minimal downtime. This demands robust construction, redundant safety systems, and designs that facilitate rapid maintenance and repair. End effectors must be carefully matched to the specific tasks, whether welding, painting, assembly, material handling, or inspection.
Medical Robotics
Medical robotics presents unique challenges including stringent safety requirements, biocompatibility of materials, sterilization compatibility, and precision requirements that often exceed those of industrial applications. Regulatory compliance with medical device standards adds complexity to the design and approval process.
Medical robots must operate reliably in close proximity to patients, often performing tasks that directly affect patient outcomes. This requires fail-safe designs, extensive testing and validation, and comprehensive risk management throughout the development process. Human factors engineering ensures that medical robots integrate smoothly into clinical workflows and are intuitive for healthcare professionals to operate.
Service and Consumer Robotics
Service robots that interact with the general public must prioritize safety, user-friendliness, and aesthetic appeal. These robots often operate in unstructured environments with untrained users, requiring robust obstacle avoidance, intuitive interfaces, and graceful handling of unexpected situations.
Consumer robotics faces additional constraints including cost sensitivity, compact size requirements, and the need for minimal maintenance. Designs must be reliable enough to operate without expert support while remaining affordable for consumer markets. User experience considerations become paramount, as consumer acceptance depends on ease of use and perceived value.
Future Trends in Robot Design
Artificial Intelligence Integration
The integration of artificial intelligence and machine learning capabilities is transforming robot design. AI enables robots to adapt to changing conditions, learn from experience, and handle complex tasks that would be difficult or impossible to program explicitly. This requires increased computational power, sophisticated sensors, and architectures that support real-time processing of large data volumes.
Edge computing brings AI processing directly to the robot rather than relying on cloud connectivity, reducing latency and enabling operation in environments without reliable network access. This trend drives demand for more powerful embedded processors and efficient algorithms that can run on resource-constrained platforms.
Autonomous Navigation and Mobility
Advances in autonomous navigation enable robots to operate independently in complex environments. This requires integration of multiple sensor types, sophisticated mapping and localization algorithms, and path planning capabilities that account for dynamic obstacles and changing conditions.
Mobile robots benefit from improvements in battery technology, motor efficiency, and lightweight materials that extend operational range and capabilities. Simultaneous localization and mapping (SLAM) algorithms allow robots to build maps of unknown environments while tracking their position within those maps, enabling autonomous exploration and navigation.
Human-Centered Design
So, following this people-centred principle, we avoid robot design decisions that will make workers feel they’re being rushed, pushed to do things in a ‘robotic’ way, or otherwise feel like they are cogs in a big machine. Instead, the machine’s form, behaviour and role in the workplace reassures workers that their skills are valued. Future robot designs increasingly emphasize collaboration with humans rather than replacement of human workers.
This human-centered approach considers not only physical safety but also psychological and social factors. Robots designed to work alongside humans should enhance human capabilities, support workflow rather than dictating it, and create positive user experiences that build trust and acceptance.
Resources for Robot Designers
Educational Platforms and Communities
Numerous resources support robot designers at all skill levels. Online communities provide forums for sharing knowledge, troubleshooting problems, and showcasing projects. Educational platforms offer courses covering fundamental concepts through advanced topics in robotics, mechanical design, electronics, and programming.
Open-source hardware and software projects provide starting points for new designs and examples of proven solutions to common challenges. Participating in robotics competitions and challenges provides practical experience and opportunities to learn from other teams’ approaches and innovations.
Professional Development
Professional organizations offer conferences, workshops, and publications that keep designers current with emerging technologies and best practices. Industry certifications validate expertise in specific areas of robotics and can enhance career opportunities. Continuing education ensures that designers maintain relevant skills as the field evolves rapidly.
Collaboration with academic institutions provides access to cutting-edge research and specialized expertise. Industry partnerships enable knowledge sharing and can accelerate development of innovative solutions by combining different perspectives and capabilities.
Key Takeaways for Successful Robot Design
Successful robot design requires balancing multiple competing factors including performance, cost, reliability, safety, and manufacturability. No single approach works for all applications; designers must tailor their methods to specific requirements and constraints. The most effective designs emerge from systematic processes that emphasize clear requirements, iterative development, comprehensive testing, and continuous improvement.
Understanding fundamental principles provides a foundation, but practical experience develops the intuition needed to make effective design decisions. Start with simple projects to build skills and confidence before tackling more complex challenges. Learn from both successes and failures, documenting lessons to build knowledge over time.
Collaboration across disciplines enhances robot design by bringing diverse perspectives and expertise to bear on complex problems. Mechanical engineers, electrical engineers, software developers, and domain experts each contribute essential knowledge. Effective communication and integration of these different viewpoints leads to more robust and innovative solutions.
The field of robotics continues to evolve rapidly, with new technologies, methods, and applications emerging regularly. Staying current requires ongoing learning and adaptation. Embrace change as an opportunity to expand capabilities and explore new possibilities. The fundamental principles of good design remain constant even as specific technologies and techniques advance.
For those interested in learning more about robotics and engineering design, resources are available through organizations like IEEE Robotics and Automation Society, which provides access to research publications, conferences, and professional networking opportunities. The Robot Operating System (ROS) offers an open-source framework widely used in robotics development. Educational platforms such as Coursera and edX provide online courses covering various aspects of robotics design and implementation. Additionally, maker communities and hackerspaces offer hands-on learning opportunities and access to tools and equipment for prototyping and experimentation.
Robot design combines art and science, requiring both technical knowledge and creative problem-solving. The most successful designers develop strong fundamentals while remaining open to unconventional approaches and innovative solutions. By following established principles, learning from experience, and continuously refining their skills, designers can create robots that effectively address real-world challenges and push the boundaries of what’s possible in robotics.