Question: How long did it take to build your robots?

Elizabeth Ratcliffe answered on 12 Mar 2014:

Hi scottc2002, I work with a company who have a team of people to build the robots, when they build a brand new robot from scratch it takes a long time to go from the idea to the prototype (practise robot) to the final robot. They have to design the robot as well as the computer software and runs lots of hardware and software tests. They also have to test the robots for the job they are going to do in a live situation so they loan the prototype out to scientists like me to put the robot through its paces, it can take months or even a year to go from an idea to a working robot and it costs a lot of money….which is why the final robots are expensive. Also if the robots are going to be used to make medicines they have to go through lots of extra testing to make sure the medicines the robots will produce are safe – to make sure germs can’t get into the medicines