The U.S. Navy announced Tuesday that it wants to use robots to make sure Marine forces are prepared for missions.
The Office of Naval Research (ONR) has started an experiment at the University of Central Florida that will continue for several weeks and have of a human surrogate greet and interact with people entering the lobby of the school's Institute for Simulation and Training, according to the International Business Times.
The Navy said researchers will use the results to show how robots will function in situations where they will need to interact much more with humans.
Dr. Peter Squire, a program officer for ONR, said the Marine Corps is developing training concepts that continue to "merge virtual and live components to create the most realistic, effective and affordable training for marines," Sputnik International reported.
"The way people react to and interact with the different surrogates in this study, is crucial to understanding how we can improve our military-training systems," Squire added in a statement.
The greeting robot is one of several experiments in the ONR's Human Surrogate Interaction Program, which officials say will see how humans will interact with physical, virtual and other forms of the technology, IBT reported.
The study is also aimed at developing the "Avatar Mediated Interactive Training and Individualized Experience System" (AMITIES) system, which will use voice modulation, artificial intelligence and other programs to allow humans to "inhabit" and control different types of robots. Researchers believe AMITIES will give birth to new ways to training military forces.
"If human role players are not available because of cost or other reasons, this research will help us understand the type of surrogate to replace them with so that the level of training is not diminished," Squire said.
The findings of the study will be used at a state-of-the-art military training facility at Camp Pendleton in California to see how the Navy can train different forces in the Marine Corps with robots, Sputnik International reported.
The U.S. Navy will hold a demonstration of new military equipment at the Naval Future Force Science and Technology EXPO from Feb. 4 to Feb. 5 in Washington. Inventions set to appear at the demonstration include a bipedal humanoid robot designed to help sailors, a fire-fighting robot and a helicopter drone.
