About this item
Innovations in the world of robotics are multiplying, with many cutting-edge breakthroughs, and this exciting and timely new book for young readers explores one particularly intriguing area the world of robo-animals, or zoobots. In an attempt to design robots that can solve problems or perform tasks that humans cant, or just cant do easily, roboticists have been looking at the unique skills some animals have. Using something called mechatronics -- mechanical and electrical engineering combined with computer science -- they are finding ways to closely mirror those skills in robot form. Some fascinating examples from the book of what zoobots can do include finding survivors of a fire using sensitive, computerized whiskers scaling skyscraper walls using super stickiness or delivering drugs deep within the human body using microscopic whiptails for locomotion.
About the Author
Helaine Becker has written over 70 books, including the #1 National bestseller, A Porcupine in a Pine Tree,and its sequel, Dashing through the Snow, Sloth at the Zoom, Dirk Daring, Secret Agent, the Looney Bay All-Stars chapter book series, non-fiction including Counting on Katherine, Worms for Breakfast and Zoobots (all Junior Library Guild Selections) , Monster Science, You Can Read, Lines Bars and Circles, and Boredom Blasters, plus many picture books and young adult novels. She also writes for children's magazines and for children's television. Her show Dr. Greenie's Mad Lab was a finalist at MIP. com Junior in Cannes. She has won the Lane Anderson Award for Science Writing for Children twice,once for The Big Green Book of the Big Blue Sea and once for The Insecto-Files, and the Picture Book of the Year Award from the Canadian Booksellers Association for A Porcupine in a Pine Tree. She has also won three Silver Birch awards and a Red Cedar award. Helaine Becker holds U.S. and Canadian citizenship. She attended high school in New York, university in North Carolina (Go Blue Devils!!!!) and now lives in Toronto with her husband and dog, Ella. She has two really handsome sons.
