Incredibly fast Rubik’s cube world record has to be seen to be believed: ScienceAlert
A robot developed at Mitsubishi Electric Corporation has just set a new world record for solving a Rubik’s cube in the shortest possible time: it achieved the feat in just 0.305 seconds, beating the previous record of 0.38 seconds that was also achieved by a robot developed by Mitsubishi.
It’s a real blink-and-you’ll-miss-it moment, as you can tell from the video of the robot in action. Luckily, the video also includes several slow replays of the achievement, so you can actually see what’s going on.
The new record holder is the TOKUI Fast Accurate Synchronized motion Testing robot – or TOKUFASTbot for short – named in part in honor of the engineer responsible for developing it. Typically, your job is to help build engines.
“To demonstrate our technical capabilities in achieving high-speed, high-precision windings, which are key to increasing the productivity and efficiency of the motors used in many of our products, our young engineers worked voluntarily to set the world record,” says Yuji Yoshimura, senior general manager at Mitsubishi Electric.
frameborder=”0″ allow=”accelerometer; Autoplay; clipboard recording; encrypted media; gyroscope; picture in picture; web-share” referrerpolicy=”strict-origin-when-cross-origin” allow fullscreen>
The TOKUFASTbot machine comes with some very useful features for handling a record like this, including a color recognition algorithm (built with proprietary AI) and a rotation mechanism that rotates 90 degrees in just 0.009 seconds.
Robots are getting better at solving these types of puzzles. In 2009 the record was 1 minute and 4 seconds. Just seven years later, the time fell below one minute for the first time. Progress to just 0.305 seconds was rapid.
However, adapting the TOKUFASTbot to solve a Rubik’s cube was not easy: at first, the robot was too fast for the plastic toy and kept getting stuck on the puzzle block. Several adjustments and refinements were necessary for the successful record attempt to be recorded.
If you’re wondering how mere humans are getting along with the iconic cube these days, the current record for solving a Rubik’s Cube by a real person currently stands at a relatively pedestrian 3.13 seconds.
Don’t feel too bad if your own solving skills aren’t that agile and quick. Erno Rubik, the man who invented the cube he named after in 1974, took an entire month to solve it for the first time. More than 43 million trillion configurations are possible on the cube. There are many wrong paths that can be taken on the way to a single solution.
As for the engineers at Mitsubishi Electric, they return to their regular jobs after setting the new record – but don’t be surprised if they return for another attempt at the record in the coming years.
“We will continue to take on exciting challenges using the technology we have cultivated in engine development to support global manufacturing,” says Yoshimura.
