The dream of having robots do household chores inched a little closer to reality last week. Figure, an OpenAI-backed robotics artificial intelligence (AI) startup, showed off humanoid robots that can understand voice commands and can grab objects they had never seen before. In a Figure video, a guy holding a bag of groceries starts unloading eggs, apple, ketchup, cheese, cookies and other items on a counter

Sanctuary AI, a developer of human-like intelligence for general-purpose robots, has introduced a new generation of tactile sensor technology designed to improve dexterous manipulation in robots.

Sanctuary is focused on achieving human-level dexterity for general purpose robots to perform high value tasks in the workplace. This requires a delicate—but durable—sense of touch to efficiently complete tasks with precision. Our team of industry-leading experts in tactile sensing have identified and met the requirements needed to build compliant, sensitive, and durable sensors at low manufacturing costs. "We know a sense of touch to be critical for dexterity," said Dr. Jeremy Fishel, Principal Researcher at Sanctuary AI. "The challenge is in developing tactile sensing technology with the right blend of features and durability to unlock dexterous manipulation and high-performance training data