04/12/13

Elektro: A robot to seek survivors after disasters

By: Lou Del Bello

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<h1>Elektro: A robot to seek survivors after disasters</h1>
<h4>By: Lou Del Bello</h4>
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<p>Alessandro Zippilli wanted to build a toy robot to explore his garden, but ended up with something much more useful: a machine capable of rescuing the survivors of <a href="https://www.scidev.net/environment/disasters/">natural disasters</a>. Elektro looks like a small, colourful car, but is fully equipped with open-source microcontrollers, lithium batteries and sensors to detect human breath under the debris of a collapsed building.<br />
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With more <a href="https://www.scidev.net/enterprise/funding/">funding</a>, Elektro could be used within international programmes to reduce the impact of natural disasters and help rescuers save lives.</p>

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<p>This article was originally published on <a href="https://www.scidev.net" target="_blank">SciDev.Net</a>. Read the <a href="https://www.scidev.net/global/multimedia/elektro-a-robot-to-seek-survivors-after-disasters/" target="_blank">original article</a>.</p>
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Alessandro Zippilli wanted to build a toy robot to explore his garden, but ended up with something much more useful: a machine capable of rescuing the survivors of natural disasters. Elektro looks like a small, colourful car, but is fully equipped with open-source microcontrollers, lithium batteries and sensors to detect human breath under the debris of a collapsed building.

With more funding, Elektro could be used within international programmes to reduce the impact of natural disasters and help rescuers save lives.