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Video: Robot Attends School And Socialises For Girl Undergoing Cancer Treatment

By R. Siva Kumar | Update Date: Nov 09, 2015 10:18 AM EST

One robot is going to be a good Samaritan of sorts. It will go to school in Maryland to help a girl continue studying even as she takes treatment for cancer.

She is 10-year-old Peyton Walton, a student at Poolesville Elementary at Poolesville, Maryland. She will be treated at the Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in New York. She was first diagnosed with a rare liver cancer called Undifferentiated Embryonic Hepatic Sarcoma.

For five weeks she can stay away from school, even as the robot she has nicknamed PAVS, or Peyton's Awesome Virtual Self, will not only go to class but even socialise with her friends!

PAVS, created by Double Robotics, is a thin robot with an iPad for its head. It displays Peyton's face in real time. It is her virtual window through which she can attend her classes as well as her class discussion at home.

Double Robotics calls the robot Double, an iPad-based telepresence robot.

Being mounted on a Segway-like roller, it can navigate through the road, according to NBC Washington.

There is an app benefits from Wi-Fi and Bluetooth connectivity. Hence, Peyton can control PAVS and manoeuvre it so that it can talk and interact with friends and teachers.

The school is appreciative of PAVS. "As they see that robot in the hallways, that's Peyton," Douglas Robbins, the school principal, told the Business Standard. "She's here, she's with us and she's going to engage in the school day, just like the rest of them."

The robot is priced at $3,000. Many friends pitched in to help Peyton pay for it.

YouTube/Double Robotics 

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