????機(jī)器人遠(yuǎn)程呈現(xiàn)技術(shù)是那些總是離我們說遠(yuǎn)不遠(yuǎn),、說近不近的技術(shù)中的一種。未來主義者說它會(huì)改變一切,。但是盡管近年來已經(jīng)有些設(shè)計(jì)得不錯(cuò)的遙控機(jī)器人技術(shù)投放市場（比如Vgo和Double Robotics）,，但是還沒有哪種解決方案的先進(jìn)性和用戶友好性能夠滿足主流需要。這種機(jī)器人可以讓人類操控者遙控操作一個(gè)自己的機(jī)器人“化身”,，從而讓這個(gè)機(jī)器人在另一個(gè)城市,、另一個(gè)國家乃至是另一個(gè)星球上的某個(gè)環(huán)境中移動(dòng)，并與其他人進(jìn)行互動(dòng),。比如說一個(gè)身在芝加哥的公司經(jīng)理,，可以借由這種技術(shù)實(shí)時(shí)參觀托皮卡市的一個(gè)工廠。但目前從很多方面上看,，遙控機(jī)器人還只是一種高價(jià)的玩具,。

????位于馬薩諸塞州貝德福德市的iRobot公司相信，它已經(jīng)改變了這種局面,。這家公司最出名的產(chǎn)品是一款可愛的自動(dòng)拖地機(jī)器人Roomba。這家公司長期以來一直非常了解客戶的需求,，不斷完善自己的技術(shù),，同時(shí)為終端用戶生產(chǎn)正確的產(chǎn)品,，不管這個(gè)用戶是有潔癖的家庭主婦，還是在阿富汗拆地雷的美國海軍拆彈專家,。（iRobot確實(shí)生產(chǎn)拆彈機(jī)器人,。）今年早些時(shí)候，iRobot公司悄悄地在北美的7家醫(yī)院里推出了一款名叫RP-VITA的遠(yuǎn)程醫(yī)療機(jī)器人（其中6家在美國,，1家在墨西哥城）,。在現(xiàn)實(shí)醫(yī)療環(huán)境中，人們怎樣看待醫(yī)療機(jī)器人的表現(xiàn),，這個(gè)問題不僅對(duì)iRobot公司和它的技術(shù)伙伴InTouch Health公司來說意義重大,，對(duì)遠(yuǎn)程機(jī)器人這門技術(shù)來說也是一樣。

????iRobot公司的CEO科林?安格爾說：“我們制造機(jī)器人和研究遠(yuǎn)程呈現(xiàn)技術(shù)已經(jīng)超過10年了,。我們意識(shí)到一個(gè)問題,，那就是，一個(gè)很酷的原型產(chǎn)品和一款真正的產(chǎn)品之間存在巨大的區(qū)別,?！卑哺駹栠€表示，該公司終于研發(fā)出了RP-VITA這款真正的遙控機(jī)器人產(chǎn)品,。如果它能在快節(jié)奏,、甚至有時(shí)極為繁雜的醫(yī)院環(huán)境中適應(yīng)下來，那么像RP-VITA這種機(jī)器人就沒有理由不能適應(yīng)其他任何環(huán)境,。RP-VITA的成功可能標(biāo)志著一股新潮流的開始,。

????醫(yī)療界是一個(gè)不錯(cuò)的試驗(yàn)田來率先使用這門技術(shù)。現(xiàn)代醫(yī)學(xué)的專門化已經(jīng)發(fā)展到了非常復(fù)雜的地步,，目前醫(yī)學(xué)這個(gè)大框架下已經(jīng)涵蓋了150多個(gè)被學(xué)界認(rèn)可的?？坪蛠唽？?，而在20世紀(jì)中葉時(shí)大概還只有20個(gè)?？谱笥摇＿h(yuǎn)程醫(yī)學(xué)機(jī)器人正是在這個(gè)領(lǐng)域找到了巨大的增長空間,。位于加州圣芭芭拉市的InTouch Health公司為醫(yī)療行業(yè)開發(fā)的界面,、應(yīng)用和遠(yuǎn)程呈現(xiàn)解決方案現(xiàn)已應(yīng)用到了700多家醫(yī)院中，使醫(yī)生們（一般是城市大醫(yī)院的專家）可以與病床上的病人通過音頻和視頻直播進(jìn)行遠(yuǎn)程電視電話會(huì)診,，還能與護(hù)士和病人進(jìn)行交流,。

????Robotic telepresence remains one of those technologies that is always lingering just on the horizon; it's going to change everything, the futurists say, just as soon as it gets here. But while several clever telerobotics solutions have come to market in recent years (Vgo and Double Robotics for instance), no solution has yet been both sophisticated and user-friendly enough for the mainstream. These robots -- designed to give a remote human operator control of a mobile surrogate robot so that, for instance, a company manager in Chicago can virtually tour a factory floor in Topeka -- allow users to move around an environment and interact with people and objects on the other side of the city, country, or planet. But for the most part, telerobots remain high-priced toys.

????Bedford, Mass.,-based iRobot (IRBT) believes it's finally changed that. The company -- perhaps best known for its adorable, automated floor-sweeping Roomba robots -- has a long, established record of understanding its customer, adequately maturing its technologies, and producing the right solution for its end users, whether that user is an immaculately clean apartment-dweller or a Navy explosives ordnance disposal specialist disarming IEDs in Afghanistan. (iRobot builds those robots too.) Earlier this year iRobot quietly rolled out its RP-VITA telemedicine robot in seven North American hospitals (six in the U.S. and one in Mexico City), and how they are received in the hospital environment could spell big things not only for iRobot and its technology partnerInTouch Health, but for telerobotics at large.

????"We've been building robots and working on the remote presence problem for well over a decade, and the one thing we have come to realize is that the difference between a cool prototype and a product is huge," says iRobot CEO Colin Angle. In RP-VITA, Angle says, the company has finally developed a real telerobotics product, and if it can survive the rigors of the fast-paced, sometimes frenetic hospital environment, there's no reason why robots like RP-VITA couldn't work anywhere. Success for RP-VITA could mark the beginning of a trend.

????Telemedicine isn't a bad place to start. Modern medicine has sprawled into an often confusing array of specializations -- currently there are something like 150 different recognized medical specialties and sub-specialties; at the middle of the last century there were roughly a dozen -- and it's here that telemedicine has found a great deal of room for growth. Santa Barbara, Calif.,-based InTouch Health creates interfaces, apps, and remote presence solutions for the health care industry that are now in more than 700 hospitals, allowing doctors -- generally specialists at larger, urban hospitals -- to digitally teleconference themselves to a patient's bedside and converse with both nurses and patients over live audio and video connections.