Many humanoid robots ran along with thousands of
human participants in a half-marathon held last month in Beijing. The event was an opportunity to showcase China’s technological strength.
According to Chinese media reports, 21 humanoid robots were put to the test along the 21km (13-mile) route. Among the participants were machines from private firms and universities such as Tsinghua.
Video footage from the state news agency Xinhua showed several human-sized robots and some smaller ones running with the competitors.
One of them, the size of a small child, was dressed in a bright silver and blue suit and wore headphones.
The race allowed both manually or semi-manually controlled robots and fully autonomous ones to compete. Some of those taking part used the race to test their artificial intelligence (AI) systems.
The teams operating the robots were allowed to change their batteries during the race.
Answer: a half-marathon
