Lowe's equips employees with exoskeletons

To gain an edge in the highly competitive retail business, companies such as Amazon and Wal-Mart have automated their warehouses with robots. Drones are also increasingly becoming a tool in warehouses and with automated deliveries. The US home improvement chain Lowe's is now looking at robotics in a different way. The company teamed up with Virginia Tech's Assistive Robotics Laboratory to equip some of its employees with exoskeletons.

This particular exoskeleton is not motorized. Instead, it uses carbon fiber in the legs and on the back to reinforce "proper lifting form," according to Lowe's. The suit makes lifting heavy objects easier by springing back to its original form as the wearer starts to raise something. Lowe's says this can make something such as a bag of concrete feel "significantly lighter to the user."

Increasingly powerful and sophisticated exoskeletons are also becoming a more common area of research and development. While the dream of having robots do everything for us continues to march on, it is becoming apparent that robotics can also be used to enhance human capability.

One of the promising areas of robotic exoskeletons is in health care. In Japan, companies, including Toyota and Honda, are already working on medical robots that can help with rehabilitation. For these types of tasks, exoskeletons make a lot of sense. In spite of all the fear surrounding robots replacing people in the workplace, there is a lot of evidence pointing toward a future collaboration between robots and humans. As Abraham Lincoln might say, "We are not enemies, but friends. We must not be enemies."