Robot Helps Disabled Kids with Rehab
AnthroTronix hopes to secure a $500,000 grant that would let it commercialize
its CosmoBot and subsequent rehabilitation technologies. 
From: InformationWeek - June 12, 2002
By: Tony Kontzer
   
A robot designed to aid in the rehabilitation of disabled children may also
represent the birth of a new company. AnthroTronix Inc. is seeking $500,000
from the National Science Foundation to help it commercialize its CosmoBot, a
robotic device invented by CEO Corinna Lathan that uses a Web interface to
track a child's gestures and voice during physical therapy. 

The small startup, which has been developing human-to-technology interfaces
for military and physical rehab applications since it was founded in 1999,
has already received a $100,000 NSF grant, but it wants to spin off a
division that would turn the CosmoBot and subsequent devices into commercial
products. And that, executive VP and CFO Carl Pompei says, will require more
money. The grant would essentially act as a seed investment. "This is the
high-risk capital we need," Pompei says. The company's goal has been to turn
its research into products that have a positive societal impact, and CosmoBot
could be the first such product, Pompei says. He says that the larger grant
also would likely improve the company's chances of attracting subsequent
venture-capital funding when it's needed.  

More than anything, the CosmoBot serves as a motivator for children who might
resist the rigors of therapy. The robot monitors a child's movements through
sensors worn by the child and via the Web-based connection between those
sensors and the robot. That provides doctors with frequent updates about a
child's condition without requiring the patient to make visits to the
doctor's office.  

http://www.informationweek.com/story/IWK20020612S0009


A Hand From Cosmobot
From: InformationWeek - June 17, 2002 - page 14
By: Tony Kontzer
   
A funny-faced robotic device designed to help disabled children may also
represent the birth of a new venture. AnthroTronix, which develops
human-to-technology interfaces, in July will seek a $500,000 grant from the
National Science Foundation to help it spin off a division to commercialize
its CosmoBot robot and future devices. The CosmoBot monitors a child's
gestures and speech during physical therapy by use of sensors and a Web
connection. Perhaps most important, it can motivate kids who might otherwise
resist the rigors of therapy. The inventor: AnthroTronix CEO Corinna Lathan,
34, who recently was named one of 100 young innovators by MIT's Technology
Review.  

http://www.informationweek.com/story/IWK20020614S0023
http://www.anthrotronix.com/index.html


The Young Innovators
From: Technology Review - June 2002 - page 78

While involved in biomedical studies funded by NASA, Cori Lathan realized
that austronauts in orbit encounter physical challenges much like those faced
by people with disabilities. An astronaut, for example, must learn to move in
an awkward space suit much the way a spinal-cord injury victim may have to
relearn to walk. The experience guided Lathan in her search for better
assistive tools as a founder and CEO of College Park, MD-based AnthroTronix.
An expert in human-performance engineering, Lathan devised interfaces that
allow children to communicate with a half-meter-tall robot via body
movements. Wireless sensors are placed on the child's body, and Lathan's
playful, furry JesterBot solicits and mimics the movements and facial
responses of its human buddy. The interaction can help a child with cerebral
palsy get through painful physical therapy. Lathan is applying similar ideas
to army research. Gestural interface technology can keep a night patrol
leader in wordless contact with soldiers equipped with goggles that display
his gestures as small icons. "I never thought about what I wanted to be," she
says. "I always just looked for cool things to do."  
