DARPA Three-Fingered Robot Hand Picks up Keys and Lifts Weights (Video)

Robotic hands have often been a problem for scientists. They can be clumsy and awkward, using too little force or too much. Now, though, researchers have developed a metal hand that's nimble enough to pick up a small set of keys while at the same time strong enough to pick up a 50-pound weight.

The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) and iRobot created the robotic hand in an effort to give robots a better way to manipulate objects. The new creation, if installed on robots, holds the potential for disarming bombs or completing dangerous military tasks that would otherwise risk human lives.

Unlike a human, though, the hand itself doesn't have five fingers. Instead, it has three fingers and a usable palm. Researchers actually strayed away from mimicking a human hand in order to give the robotic hand a more fluid motion. The machine itself is part of DARPA's Autonomous Robotic Manipulation (ARM-H) program, which develops low-cost and agile robotic hand hardware.

"The ARM-H hand is constructed using a variety of methods, including 3D printing, custom plastic and rubber molding, as well as classical machining techniques each to construct separate parts of the hand," wrote Mark Claffee, principle robotics engineer at iRobot, to CBSNews.com.

Claffee and his colleagues spent the past two years working on the hand, according to NBC News. The latest and greatest version can palm a basketball, lift weights and perform delicate maneuvers that make it extremely valuable as a tool for tasks that would normally need a human to perform.

"What we were tasked to do was to develop a brand-new hand that was more capable, more robust, more dexterous and [can be built] at a lower cost than any hand available on the market right now," said Claffee in an interview with NBC News.

It seems like Claffee and his colleagues have succeeded. Most robotic hands go for around $5,000. This new hand, in contrast, goes for around $3,000. The lower production costs associated with the hand could make it more widely available for robots.

Want to see the robotic hand in action? Check out the video below, originally appearing here.