DailyDirt: Foodie Robots Getting More Distinguishing Palates

from the urls-we-dig-up dept

Robots (humanoid or otherwise) don't really need to eat, but they could help us wetware-based beings eat better -- if we design machines to do so. It's a bit tricky, though, for robots to experience food the way we do. However, machines could help make food safer by identifying contaminants or make foods more consistent in quality by identifying components that are necessary, for instance, to make a fine wine as fine as people think it is. Here are a few bots that might beat humans at a food/drink identification contest someday.

• Mashgin is the name of a robot vision kiosk that can identify a plate of food in a few seconds (and act as an automated cashier in a high tech cafeteria.) Apparently, it can recognize the difference between a Fuji apple and a Honeycrisp, but will it also notice the shrinkage? [url]
• If you're a stickler for authentic Thai food, there's a robot that might be able to point you in the right direction when you're looking for a lunch spot. The Thai government funded an e-delicious machine to differentiate bad green Thai curry from... an authentic government standard version of green curry. Yum? [url]
• Spanish researchers at the Autonomous University of Barcelona have developed an electronic tongue that can identify beers with about 80% accuracy. The robot doesn't get drunk or tired and never gets sick of tasting beer, sorta like Homer Simpson eating donuts in hell. [url]

If you'd like to read more awesome and interesting stuff, check out this unrelated (but not entirely random!) Techdirt post via StumbleUpon.

Filed Under: automation, beer, computer vision, e-delicious, foodies, mashgin, robot taster, robots, senses, taste, thai curry