Rescue Robotics pioneer Robin Murphy 救援机器人先驱罗宾·墨菲

Rescue Robotics 救援机器人

Robin Murphy is a pioneer, an international leader and one of the few women in a field that men tend to dominate.
罗宾·墨菲是一位先驱者，一位国际领域的领导者，同时也是那个通常由男性主导的领域中的少数女性之一。

July 9, 2013 2013 年 7 月 9 日

https://stories.tamu.edu/news/2013/07/09/rescue-robotics/

It is an all too familiar sight after tragedies such as earthquakes, hurricanes or mudslides: people furiously digging through the rubble in the hopes of locating survivors.
在地震、飓风或泥石流等悲剧发生后，这种场景变得十分常见：人们疯狂地翻找废墟，希望能找到幸存者。

A similar scene drove Robin Murphy into rescue robotics. Murphy is a professor in Texas A&M’s Department of Computer Science and Engineering and director of the TEES Center for Robot-Assisted Search and Rescue (CRASAR).
类似的场景促使罗宾·墨菲投身于救援机器人的研发事业。墨菲是德克萨斯 A&M 大学计算机科学与工程系的教授，同时还是 TEES 机器人辅助搜索与救援中心的主任。

It was 1995, and having watched news reports on both the Oklahoma City bombing and the Kobe City earthquake, Murphy — who had conducted her Ph.D. research in robotics — decided it was time to focus her work on rescue robotics.
那是 1995 年，当时墨菲观看了关于俄克拉荷马城爆炸事件和科比城地震的新闻报道后，她开始研究机器人救援技术。她原本在机器人技术领域从事博士研究，此时她决定将工作重点转向机器人救援领域。

“Rescue robotics was strictly an emotional response,” says Murphy, the Raytheon Professor in the Dwight Look College of Engineering’s Department of Computer Science and Engineering. “Artificial intelligence for robotics had been focusing on small robots with the thought of sending dozens of them up to Mars.”
“救援机器人技术本质上是一种情感化的响应，”雷神大学教授、德怀特学院工程与计算机科学系教授墨菲说道。“在机器人领域的人工智能研究一直集中在小型机器人上，目的是将数十个这样的机器人送往火星。”

It then became so clear to her that those same robots could be exploring under the rubble of a disaster and helping find victims.
于是，她清楚地意识到，那些机器人可以在灾难的废墟下探索，并帮助寻找受害者。

“At some point I thought, I could be one of 200 people doing planetary robots, I could be one of 200 people doing health care, but somebody needs to step up and do this idea of rescue robotics.”
“在某个时刻，我心想，自己也可以成为那 200 个人中的一员，参与制造行星机器人工作；或者成为那 200 个人中的一员，从事医疗保健工作。但是，总得有人站出来，来实现这个关于救援机器人的梦想。”

And that is exactly what Murphy did. Seeing an opportunity to make a difference, she seized it and immersed herself in rescue robotics, a field where she has become an international leader and one of the few women involved.
而墨菲正是这么做的。她看到了能够有所作为的机会，于是抓住了这个机会，全身心地投入到救援机器人技术的研究中。如今，她已经成为了这一领域的国际领袖，也是少数几位在相关领域取得成就的女性之一。

Robin Murphy controls CRASAR aerial robot.
罗宾·墨菲负责操控 CRASAR 空中机器人。

A Rarity In Her Field 她所在领域中的稀有人才

Robotics, and even more so rescue robotics, is dominated by men. And when Murphy is on the site of a disaster, she is usually the only woman.
在机器人技术领域，尤其是在救援机器人领域，男性占据着主导地位。而当墨菲出现在灾难现场时，她通常也是唯一的女性。

“At Crandall Canyon Utah, the 2007 mine collapse, I think there were 40 guys on this mountain and we were a two-hour drive from anything,” Murphy says. “We were way up in the mountains, and I was the only woman.”
“在犹他州的克兰德尔峡谷，2007 年发生了一起矿难。当时有 40 个人在那个山上工作，而我们距离最近的地点有两小时的驾驶距离。”墨菲说：“我们身处山区的顶端，而我则是唯一的女性。”

But Murphy’s work is starting to open the eyes of young women, helping them to realize that they too can break into the male-dominated field. An April 2010 episode of the PBS show SciGirls titled “Robots to the Rescue” featured Murphy, a female graduate student and four junior high girls.
不过，墨菲的工作开始启发年轻女性，让她们意识到自己也能进入男性主导的领域。在 2010 年 4 月的一期 PBS 节目《SciGirls》中，有一集名为《机器人来救援》的节目，其中就出现了墨菲——一位女性研究生，以及四位初中女生。

The show, which is aimed at getting young girls interested in science, technology, engineering and math, had the girls work with Murphy and her team to develop a personality for a rescue robot.
这场节目旨在激发年轻女孩对科学、技术、工程和数学的兴趣。参与者们与墨菲及其团队一起合作，为救援机器人设计一个独特的形象。

“It is a real exciting thing for me to be considered a mentor,” Murphy says. “I think it is that big moment when you realize, ‘I’ve got something to offer these young women.’ Between robotics and search and rescue, there are just not a lot of women.”
“能被选为导师真是令人兴奋的事情，”墨菲说。“我觉得这就像是某个重要的时刻——你意识到‘我有东西可以奉献给这些年轻女性’。在机器人技术和搜救领域，这样的女性其实并不多。”

From The Beginning 从一开始

Robotics, much less rescue robotics, wasn’t always on the radar for Murphy. When she was a youngster, the big question was whether she would become a nuclear physicist or a mechanical engineer like her father. Although she didn’t know which field of engineering she would choose, she was sure engineering was the discipline she would study.
对于墨菲来说，机器人技术，更不用说救援机器人技术了，从来都不是她感兴趣的领域。在她年轻的时候，她一直在思考自己应该成为一名核物理学家，还是像父亲那样成为一名机械工程师。虽然她不知道自己会选择哪个工程领域，但她确信自己会选择工程学作为自己的专业。

“My dad was a mechanical engineer,” she says. “I was an only child, so I was my dad’s only son. Of course I was going to be an engineer; I always wanted to be.”
“我的父亲是一名机械工程师，”她说。“我是独生女，所以我是父亲唯一的儿子。当然，我注定要成为一名工程师；我一直都想成为这样的专业人士。”

Murphy made the choice to follow her father’s profession, earning her undergraduate degree from Georgia Tech in mechanical engineering. When it came time to pursue her graduate degree, Murphy went another route, electing to get her Ph.D. in computer science, also from Georgia Tech, after working in industry for several years.
墨菲选择追随父亲的职业道路，从乔治亚理工学院获得了机械工程专业的学士学位。当她考虑攻读研究生学位时，墨菲选择了另一条路径——在从事了几年工业工作之后，她决定从乔治亚理工学院攻读计算机科学专业的博士学位。

During her work toward the graduate degree, she became interested in artificial intelligence (AI) – despite initially thinking the field was a joke.
在攻读研究生学位的过程中，她对人工智能领域产生了兴趣——尽管最初她认为这个领域是个笑话。

“When I went to grad school in computer science, I had a fellowship that required me to work with somebody in computer science that was a member of the Computer Integrated Manufacturing program,” Murphy says. “There was a new guy who did artificial intelligence for robots, and I believed that was totally ludicrous. But I needed a mentor.
“当我攻读计算机科学硕士学位时，我获得了一个研究奖学金，这个奖学金要求我与一位从事计算机集成制造领域研究的计算机科学家合作。当时有一个新来的小伙子，他从事机器人人工智能方面的研究，我觉得他的研究方向完全不合逻辑。不过，我确实需要一位导师。”墨菲说道。

“I thought AI was a joke and the robots you see for manufacturing that I was exposed to from mechanical engineering were very stupid and you would never use them for anything interesting. Of course I was wrong.
“我原以为人工智能只是个笑话而已，那些在制造过程中使用的机器人看起来非常愚蠢，根本不可能被用于任何有趣的任务。当然，我错了。”

“Within a month I fell in love with AI – making things smarter, duplicating some of the wonderful things we know about biological intelligence, combining that with the differences of silicon-based systems. I just totally fell in love with it and never looked back.”
“在一个月的时间里，我彻底爱上了人工智能——它让事物变得更加智能，复制了我们所了解的一些关于生物智能的奇妙特性，同时结合了基于硅基系统的优势。我真的完全爱上了它，从此不再回头。”

Getting Her Start 让她崭露头角

After completing her Ph.D., Murphy joined the faculty at the Colorado School of Mines in Golden, Colo. The major focus at the School of Mines was on planetary robots because of ties to Colorado’s space community.
在完成博士学位后，墨菲加入了位于科罗拉多州戈尔登的科罗拉多矿业学院的教学队伍。由于与科罗拉多州的太空研究领域的紧密联系，该学院主要致力于行星机器人的研究。

Murphy fell in line and was working in the field of planetary robots, but the 1995 bombing at the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City shifted her focus. She says she realized the same small, rugged, agile and lightweight robots being proposed for Mars could be used to dive into the rubble where rescuers could not go.
墨菲顺从了众人的意愿，开始从事行星机器人领域的工作。然而，1995 年俄克拉荷马城阿尔弗雷德·P·穆拉联邦大楼的爆炸事件让她改变了主意。她意识到，那些被提议用于火星的微小、坚固、敏捷且轻质的机器人，完全可以用来深入废墟之中，以便救援人员能够到达那些难以进入的地方。

The switch in focus carried risks because administrators and AI researchers viewed rescue robotics the way most people view robots — futuristic and too hard to be practical. Undeterred, Murphy made the drastic switch, beginning what would turn into a pioneering career.
这个被关注的领域存在风险，因为管理员和人工智能研究人员将救援机器人视为一种未来主义的产品，认为它们过于复杂，难以实现实际应用。不过，墨菲并没有被这些顾虑所动摇，他毅然做出了这个改变，从而开启了一段开创性的职业生涯。

With a change in focus came a change in universities as well. Murphy moved to the University of South Florida, where she was encouraged to devote herself to the fledgling field of rescue robotics despite skepticism from traditional AI researchers. Murphy and her students were mentored by Florida Task Force 3 starting in 1999 and eventually became technical search specialists.
随着研究重点的转变，大学的布局也发生了相应的变化。墨菲被调到了南佛罗里达大学，在那里，尽管传统的人工智能研究人员持怀疑态度，她仍被鼓励投身于新兴的救援机器人技术领域。从 1999 年开始，墨菲和她的学生们在佛罗里达任务组 3 的指导下进行学习，最终成为了技术搜索领域的专家。

While at South Florida, Murphy participated in an event that is still special to her – the response to the collapse of the World Trade Center. Ten days earlier, a former graduate student and Defense Advanced Research Program Agency program manager had founded.
在南佛罗里达期间，墨菲参加了一个对她来说非常特别的活动——对世界贸易中心倒塌事件的反应。十天前，一位前研究生和国防高级研究计划署的项目经理成立了这个组织。

When the planes struck, he and Murphy began coordinating CRASAR’s first mission: how to get robots to assist in finding the black boxes from the planes.
当飞机发动攻击时，他和墨菲开始协调 CRASAR 的第一次任务：如何让机器人协助寻找那些来自飞机的黑色盒子。

Then the buildings collapsed and getting the robots to New York to assist in searching the rubble became even more urgent. By noon, Murphy had packed her husband’s new van with robots, batteries, tools and three graduate students. Following the New York State Emergency Office’s invitation, she drove to New York City and met with other members of the CRASAR team.
随后，建筑物开始倒塌，于是更加迫切需要把机器人送到纽约，以协助清理废墟。到了中午时分，墨菲已经把丈夫的新面包车装满了机器人、电池、工具，还有三名研究生。在纽约州紧急事务办公室的邀请下，她驱车前往纽约市，并与其他 CRASAR 团队的成员会面。

“In many ways it is so hard to describe 9/11 if you were not there,” Murphy says. “The interesting thing was we knew at the time that it was going to be the Pearl Harbor for our generation.
“在很多方面，如果你没有亲身经历过，就很难描述 9/11 事件的情况，”墨菲说。“有趣的是，当时我们就知道，那将是我们这一代人的‘珍珠港’。”

“What we really didn’t understand was how significant it was going to be for rescue robots. We knew it was going to be the first time rescue robots had ever been used for any disaster anywhere that’s been recorded.”
“我们实际上并不清楚这对救援机器人来说有多重要。我们知道，这是救援机器人首次被用于任何灾难现场。”

The utility of small robots to penetrate deep in the rubble in voids too small or too hot for search dogs or people was a major surprise to the Japanese robotics community, which had favored larger, more construction-like robots that could remove the rubble. The robots also gained added credibility for their use in Afghanistan by the U.S. Department of Defense.
小型机器人能够深入废墟中的狭小空间进行探测，这些空间对于搜索犬或人类来说过于狭窄或温度过高，这一特性让日本的机器人界感到非常惊讶。此前，日本一直倾向于使用体型更大、更适合清理废墟的机器人。此外，美国国防部对这类机器人的认可也进一步提升了它们的可信度。

A New Type Of Robot 一种新型机器人

The World Trade Center disaster has had a lasting effect on rescue robotics, serving as a learning experience for those involved and helping them to fine-tune the robots being used, as well as making the robots more friendly and comforting to victims.
世界贸易中心灾难对救援机器人技术产生了深远的影响。这一事件为相关人员提供了宝贵的经验，帮助他们改进所使用的机器人技术，同时使得这些机器人对受害者来说更加友善和易于接近。

One such robot, “Survivor Buddy,” is Murphy’s pet project, and her efforts are paramount in the creation of what is considered the first robot built specifically for interacting with a trapped victim waiting to be extricated.
这种机器人被称为“幸存者伙伴”，是墨菲的得意之作。她在开发这款专为与被困受害者互动而设计的机器人方面发挥了至关重要的作用。

“The Survivor Buddy project has its roots in 9/11,” Murphy says. “For several years we had been discussing how we would use the robots to find survivors. As we were driving up there, we realized we hadn’t gotten beyond that point: What would we do if we found one? That persisted with us, and we started looking at things like a protocol.”
“‘幸存者伙伴’项目的起源可以追溯到 9/11 事件之后，”墨菲说。“多年来，我们一直在思考如何利用这些机器人来寻找幸存者。当我们开车前往那个地方时，我们发现自己还没有解决那个问题：如果我们找到了一个幸存者，该怎么办呢？这个问题一直困扰着我们，于是我们开始考虑制定相关协议。”

They also began to look at the physical attributes of the robots, everything from their color to the amount of noise they make.
他们还开始关注机器人的物理特性，包括它们的颜色、噪音水平等等。

“Most rescue robots, or robots that get sold for these things, are black and loud,” Murphy says.
“大多数用于救援的机器人，或者那些被出售用来执行这些任务的机器人，都是黑色的，而且声音很大，”墨菲说。

Also, most victims would be in the dark, and having something with bright lights coming at them would more than likely add to their panic or fear. This concern was confirmed when Murphy and her colleagues took turns playing victims in test runs, and later by a Ph.D. thesis she directed.
此外，大多数受害者都处于黑暗之中，而突然出现的亮光很可能会加剧他们的恐慌或恐惧情绪。当墨菲和她的同事们轮流扮演受害者的角色进行测试时，这一情况得到了证实；后来，她指导的一项博士论文也证实了这一点。

“As we took turns being victims, we realized the robots were scary,” Murphy says.
“当我们轮流成为受害者时，我们意识到这些机器人其实很可怕，”墨菲说。

So Murphy and her colleagues at Stanford University set out to design a robot that would not only be able to find victims but also help to comfort survivors as they waited for rescuers to reach them.
因此，墨菲和她在斯坦福大学的同事们着手设计一种机器人，这种机器人不仅能找到受害者，还能在等待救援人员到来的过程中给予幸存者安慰。

“Whenever you have an MRI, they give you your choice of music, anything to keep you comforted and from being bored,” Murphy says. “Not only can we do two-way audio, but we can do full Web streaming. You can watch your favorite TV show; you can talk to your friends. You can do whatever. Why not make it two-way video and streaming Web services?
“每次进行核磁共振检查时，他们都会为您提供多种音乐选择， anything 都可以让您感到舒适，避免无聊。”墨菲说。“我们不仅可以提供双向音频播放功能，还可以实现完整的网络流媒体服务。您可以观看最喜欢的电视节目，也可以与朋友聊天。总之，我们可以实现双向视频通话和网络服务。为什么不能做到这一点呢？”

“We pitched this to Microsoft as part of its initiative on how to use the Web and Web-enabled robots, and they loved it. We called the project the ‘Survivor Buddy’ because it was going to be your buddy. The National Science Foundation has since picked up the project, as it offers real insight into eldercare and other situations where you might be using the robot as your connection with the larger world.”
我们向微软推荐了这个项目，作为他们关于如何利用网络以及联网机器人的一系列计划的一部分。微软非常喜欢这个想法。我们将这个项目命名为“幸存者伙伴”，因为它确实能成为你的伴侣般的朋友。后来，美国国家科学基金会也加入了这个项目，因为它能为我们提供关于老年人护理等问题的真实见解，也能帮助我们在其他情况下利用机器人来连接外部世界。

Popular Science also gave Survivor Buddy a “Best 100 of 2009” award.
《大众科学》杂志还授予《幸存者》节目主持人“2009 年最佳 100 名”称号。

Another Move 另一个动作

In 2008, Murphy, along with CRASAR, moved to Texas A&M, in what could be considered a coup for the university. The move allowed Murphy to take full advantage of Disaster City, a 52-acre training facility created by the Texas A&M Engineering Extension Service (TEEX), an agency in The Texas A&M University System. TEEX delivers the full array of skills and techniques needed by emergency response professionals and a large staff that includes state and federal response teams and instructors.
2008 年，墨菲与 CRASAR 一起搬到了德州 A&M 大学。这一举措对该大学来说无疑是一个重大胜利。通过搬迁，墨菲能够充分利用“灾难之城”这个占地 52 英亩的训练基地。该基地由德州 A&M 大学系统内的德州 A&M 工程扩展服务局负责运营。该机构为紧急响应专业人员提供全面的技能与技巧培训，其员工还包括来自州和联邦政府的响应团队及教官。

The facility, which is a mock community, features full-scale, collapsible structures, offering Murphy the perfect setting to test her rescue robots. Murphy also pointed to the people of Texas A&M as another reason for her move to College Station.
这个模拟社区设施拥有全尺寸的可折叠结构，为墨菲测试她的救援机器人提供了理想的场所。墨菲还指出，德州农工大学的人们也是她选择搬往学院站的一个原因。

“The facilities here are incredible,” Murphy says. “But better yet, we have real users with a true spirit of collaboration. This is a group of people on campus and at TEEX working on emergency informatics that really wants to work together. Already, we’re in the finals for an $18 million NSF Engineering Research Center on our first try.
“这里的设施非常出色，”墨菲说。“但更棒的是，我们有真正愿意合作的用户。这群人来自校园内以及 TEEX 的各地，他们致力于紧急信息学的研究，并且真心希望能够一起合作。目前，我们刚刚成功争取到了一个价值 1800 万美元的国家科学基金会工程研究中心的资助，这真是千载难逢的机会。”

“Texas A&M is a wonderful place, and I can do more here in the next 10 years than I can do in 20 years in any other place in the United States, actually the world.”
“德州 A&M 大学是个非常不错的地方。在接下来的 10 年里，我在这里能做的事情，比在美国任何其他地方，甚至在整个世界上，我在 20 年内能做的事情还要多。”