The U.S. Army Medical Research and Development Command has issued a request for information on robots of varying degrees of autonomy that could be used as part of the providing emergency medical assistance to the soldiers and to evacuate the wounded.

It is believed that robotic systems of different classes can significantly reduce the burden on fighters, as well as reduce casualties among personnel. Robotic devices for medical evacuation will help speed up the delivery of wounded fighters to hospitals.

The U.S. Army Medical Research and Development Command is interested in robots of different classes, including drones, ground robots and various sort of robotic ships.

The military suggests that the new robots should be able to work together with humans, including following a human-controlled machine and providing support to medics. The medical robot must also have a toolkit for medical diagnosis.

“Uses of autonomy of particular interest are resupply, evacuation, prolonged field care, and transition and transfer through to military treatment facilities,”

“navigation assistants that can dynamically combine terrain data, combat environment data, injury data, etc, to plan optimal routes, equipment and contingencies for evacuation missions”.

In May this year, the U.S. Air Force Command announced a tender for the development and testing of drones that could be used to quickly evacuate downed pilots. The new devices must be adapted for air relief.

According to the requirements of the U.S. military, a rescue drone must have a combat radius of at least 185 kilometres. It must fly at a speed of at least 100 knots. The device must also be able to operate in high altitudes at an altitude of 1.2 thousand meters above sea level.