n MACHINE BUILDING Cerba includes four Mitsubishi FR-Series Scara robots with 20kg payload capacities and a maximum reach of 1m. The robots, powered by Mitsubishi’s Melsec iQ-R controller, can reach speeds of 13,283mm/s. The controller also supervises the rest of the handling system, which is automated using MR-J4 servodrives and E800 variable-speed drives. The workcell is currently undergoing final commissioning at Lab Cerba’s purpose-built facility in Paris. While there is currently no direct integration between the PAA workcell and the TLA, Lab Cerba technicians can now load the workcell with racks of samples, instead of having to process each sample manually in and out of the cold storage system. This will increase productivity significantly. PAA is collaborating with TLA partners to create a bi-directional physical and data connection with TLA systems. Using PAA’s integration software this connection will provide the bridge between research and diagnostics, enabling faster scientific breakthroughs in novel blood biomarker screening. The ability to conduct novel screening assays at scale will further accelerate pathology automation in Europe. Since PAA developed the automated cold storage interface for Lab Cerba, other potential customers have identified hospitals and pathology groups throughout Europe that could benefit from this type of platform. “We’ve effectively taken industrial automation methodologies and approaches in technology and applied them to this industry,” Newman-Smith concludes. n Automated machine sets new record for solving Rubik’s Cube Mitsubishi Electric says it has set a new record for the fastest robotic machine to solve a Rubik’s Cube puzzle. Its machine took just 0.305 seconds to complete the puzzle – beating the previous record of 0.38s, which Mitsubishi itself set in 2021. The new record has been ratified by the Guinness World Records organisation. The puzzle-solving machine – called the Tokui Fast Accurate Synchronised motion Testing Robot (TokuFastbot) – is based on factory automation technologies including an AI-powered colour-recognition algorithm, and servomotors that can rotate through 90 degrees in 0.009s. Other elements of the machine include a PLC, an industrial PC, a touch panel display and machine vision cameras and lighting, all designed to achieve high-speed signal connections and inter-device controls. A program analyses the blockrotation process to achieve matching colours on each face of the cube in the shortest number of moves. An algorithm identifies the colours of the individual blocks using proprietary AI to ensure accuracy, even when the appearance of the blocks vary because of changing positions or shadows cast by the grippers. The algorithm can recognise red and orange blocks reliably. These colours can be difficult to distinguish because of their similar hues. https://youtu.be/59qgzzSD1tk Mitsubishi’s puzzle-solving machine uses six high-speed servomotors to rotate the sides of the Rubik’s Cube through 90 degrees in 0.009s Four Scara supplied by Mitsubishi form the heart of the French sample-processing machine
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