With robots set to play a more prominent role in society in the coming years, it makes sense to find fun ways to educate youngsters on the technology. To that end, Thomas Alva has developed Edison, a palm-sized, bright orange, programmable robot compatible with Lego bricks that is intended as an affordable introduction to programming and robotics.
Named to reflect its “inventive spirit,” Edison features a host of sensors and runs on open source software. Each small bot is programmable and interacts with the world via IR transmitters and receivers, line tracking, barcode reading, playing sounds and music, and sound detection. One Edison can communicate with another over IR, with the units also able to be programmed to by controlled via TV and DVD remotes.
