NEW TOYOTA ROBOT

But Toyota’s new robot played a pretty solid “Pomp and Circumstance” on the violin Thursday. The 152-centimetre [about 5 feet] tall white robot used its mechanical fingers to push the strings correctly and bowed with its other arm, coordinating the movements well. Toyota Motor Corp. has already shown robots that roll around to work as guides and have fingers dexterous enough to play the trumpet.

Toyota President Katsuaki Watanabe said robotics will be a core business for the company in coming years. He says Toyota will test out its robots at hospitals, Toyota-related facilities and other places starting next year. He hopes to see partner robots in use by 2010.

“We want to create robots that are useful for people in everyday life,” he told reporters at a Toyota showroom in Tokyo. Watanabe and other Toyota officials said robotics was a natural extension of the automaker’s use of robots in manufacturing, as well as the development of technology for autos related to artificial intelligence, such as sensors and pre-crash safety