Canine Robot Coach to keep Dieter’s on a Leash

A ROBOT dog that monitors your daily food intake and exercise levels and warns you not to eat that cheesecake could encourage people to stick to their diets.

The health-conscious dog connects wirelessly to the dieter’s pedometer and an electronic diary of their eating habits, to calculate their daily calorie intake and expenditure.

Its US developers from MIT Media Lab hope the robot, a souped-up version of Sony’s dog Aibo, could ultimately help in the fight against the western world’s obesity epidemic.

The system is being designed by Cynthia Breazeal at the MIT Media Lab in Cambridge, Massachusetts, who is famed for creating the emotional robot Kismet. It would use a pedometer, bathroom scales and a PDA connected by Bluetooth or Wi-Fi to gather information about weight, activity and eating habits that people generally have trouble calculating, remembering and reporting.

A computer will then accurately analyse the data and present the results to the person through the friendly face of a robot, says Breazeal’s student Cory Kidd, who is working with her to develop the system, which is still at an early stage.

Source: The Pet Blog