The incredibly fast Rubik’s Cube world record has to be seen to be believed: ScienceAlert

A robot developed by Mitsubishi Electric Corporation has just set a new world record for solving a Rubik’s Cube in the shortest possible time: it accomplished the feat in just 0.305 seconds, beating the previous record of 0.38 seconds, also set by a robot developed by Mitsubishi.

It’s a moment that can be missed in the blink of an eye, as can be seen in the video of the robot in action. Thankfully, the video also includes several slowed-down replays of the performance, so you can actually see what’s going on.

The new record holder is the TOKUI Fast Accurate Synchronized Motion Testing robot – TOKUFASTbot for short – which is named after the engineer who was primarily responsible for its development. It normally helps build engines.

“To demonstrate our technical capabilities in producing high-precision, high-speed windings, which are critical to increasing the productivity and efficiency of the motors used in many of our products, our young engineers volunteered to set the world record,” says Yuji Yoshimura, Senior General Manager at Mitsubishi Electric.

frameborder=”0″ allow=”accelerometer; autoplay; write clipboard; encrypted media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web sharing” referrerpolicy=”strict-origin-when-cross-origin” allowfullscreen>

The TOKUFASTbot machine is equipped with some very useful features to achieve such a record, including a color recognition algorithm (based on proprietary artificial intelligence) and a rotation mechanism that rotates 90 degrees in just 0.009 seconds.

Robots are getting better and better at solving such puzzles. In 2009, the record was 1 minute 4 seconds. Just seven years later, the time was under a minute for the first time. The progress to just 0.305 seconds was rapid.

Adapting TOKUFASTbot to solve a Rubik’s Cube was not easy, however: At first, the robot was too fast for the plastic toy and kept getting stuck in the puzzle block. Various adjustments and refinements were necessary to successfully complete the record attempt.

If you’re wondering how normal people cope with the legendary cube these days, the current record for solving a Rubik’s Cube by a real human is currently a relatively idle 3.13 seconds.

Don’t feel too bad if your own solving skills aren’t nearly as agile and quick. Erno Rubik, the man who invented the cube he gave his name to in 1974, took a full month to solve it the first time. More than 43 million trillion configurations are possible on the cube. That’s a lot of wrong turns to make on the way to a single solution.

After setting the new record, Mitsubishi Electric engineers are now returning to their regular jobs. But don’t be surprised if they come back for another record attempt in the coming years.

“We will continue to take on exciting challenges, leveraging the technology we have developed in engine development to support global manufacturing,” says Yoshimura.