Purpose of This Robot (Score 2, Informative)

It seems that most of us have missed the importance of this robot. I was fortunate enough to see the research group present for this and another of their robots (which does the same thing but is large enough to carry a substantial cargo as well). This robot autonomously digitizes large enviorments including texture maps on it. While admittidly there is room for improvement it is more than just an important step. It could be snuck up into all sorts of places people can't fit and be used to search through rubble, or be used to search through spaces in the pyramids too small for people to fit through. Similar technology could be used in space probes sent to places like mars to digitize the enviorment where human control over them takes an extremely long time, or on the bottom of the ocean giving us an image of it we didnt otherwise have. While similar robots have existed this one pans the time of flight laser scanner in order to digitize the entire room, and while it doesnt do it super quickly I saw a video of it working and it does work fairly fast. It should be able to digitize a decent size room in 3 or 4 minutes fairly completely.