JAPAN: Robot baby teaches young people the joys of parenthood

Record ID: 401734

  • Title: JAPAN: Robot baby teaches young people the joys of parenthood
  • Date: 23rd March 2010
  • Summary: TSUKUBA, JAPAN (RECENT) (REUTERS) ROBOT BABY YOTARO SLEEPING GRADUATE STUDENT HIROKI KUNIMURA ENTERING YOTARO'S ROOM YOTARO WAKING UP TO RATTLE SOUND KUNIMURA SMILING KUNIMURA'S HANDS TOUCHING YOTARO'S CHEEKS COMPUTER AND PROJECTOR BEHIND PANEL YOTARO'S FACE ON COMPUTER SCREEN YOTARO'S FACE SEEN FROM THE BACK (SOUNDBITE) (Japanese) UNIVERSITY OF TSUKUBA GRADUATE
  • Embargoed: 7th April 2010 13:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: Japan
  • Country: Japan
  • Topics: Science / Technology,Education
  • Reuters ID: LVAF4QC8UK621ILNEHNK30GKYOUJ
  • Story Text: Japanese graduate students create a robot baby so young people can experience the joys of being parents.
    A group of Japanese graduate students at the University of Tsukuba are hoping to teach the joys of parenthood with a baby robot.
    Named Yotaro, this automated doll wakes up and giggles when a rattle is shaken. He can sulk and doze off like a real toddler, and just like the cuddliest of the babies he will smile if you rub his stomach.
    His parents are the students of the Graduate School of Comprehensive Human Sciences who created him last year with touch sensors and a projector that projects the facial features onto a warm silicon balloon which is Yotaro's face.
    Yotaro is meant to be feel, sound and react like a new born baby.
    His facial expressions and body movements change according to the pressure applied to his body parts. The information collected through touch sensors under his silicon skin is processed by a special program which then changes the baby's expression projected onto the robot's balloon-sized face from behind.
    Despite appearances, Yotaro has been won many international design awards.
    "We wanted to create a new type of robot that is soft, cuddly and cute," said project leader Hiroki Kunimura.
    "We'd like people to experience the innocent, joyful expressions typical of small babies.
    Through this experience, it would be great if some people started feeling that they wanted to have their own baby, if they started feeling that working is not everything and if they started feeling that they want a family," he said.
    To make him seem more human, the team created features which enable the robot to sneeze and have a runny nose using a heated water pump system.
    A bonnet with little bear ears and a pastel colour blanket cover The robot's limbs which simulate wiggling with the help of a geared motor.
    Kunimura and his team hope that Yotaro's cartoon-character features and cuteness will help solve Japan's low fertility rate problem by motivating young people to have children.
    Japan's fertility rate, currently at 1.37 percent, remains among the lowest in the developed world and compared to 2.12 in the United States and 1.84 in Britain.
    According to a Ministry of Labour and Welfare report, Japan, with a population of 127.6 million is set to face serious economic consequences as it expects over a quarter of its citizens to be aged over 65 by 2015.
    The population is expected to shrink by a third within 50 years if the birth rate does not increase.
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