Robotic dog controlled with a computer powered by human blood cells — SkimNews
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- Cortical Labs created and commercialised CL1, a biological computer whose cells are made from stem cells generated from blood donated with consent.
- CL1 was trained to navigate toward a target in a simulated 2D environment, after which its training data controlled the movements of a real robotic dog.
- Ferrante Neri said the company’s not-yet-peer-reviewed paper showed a neural network improving over time while receiving the same digital data—promising evidence of learning from limited experience, but only an early step toward real-world navigation.
- Cortical Labs demonstrated the technology playing Pong in 2021, before extending the cellular-computing approach to physical robotics.
- Cortical Labs said biological computers could be less energy-intensive than digital alternatives, which it framed as an advantage for robots constrained by battery life.
- Brett Kagan said biology has evolved to adapt and respond to the world in real time, while digital robotics still struggles with obstacle avoidance, higher-order control, navigation and pathfinding.
- Brett Kagan said there is no evidence that CL1 cells experience pain or suffering, while Cortical Labs is addressing the possibility through careful monitoring by independent groups.
Why it matters: For robotics developers, CL1 connects learning from limited experience with physical navigation, while the company’s energy-efficiency claim targets a key constraint: battery life. Cortical Labs’ 2021 Pong demonstration and the new robotic-dog test mark two practical milestones, although the latter’s paper has not yet been peer-reviewed.
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