Abstract

    Robotics researchers increasingly agree that ideas from biology and self-organization can strongly benefit the design of autonomous robots. Biological organisms have evolved to perform and survive in a world characterized by rapid changes, high uncertainty, indefinite richness, and limited availability of information. The term "Soft Robotics" designates a new generation of robots capable of functioning in the real world by capitalizing on "soft" designs at various levels: surface (skin, deformable tissue), movement mechanisms (muscles, tendons), and interaction with other agents (smooth, friendly interaction).

In this talk, I will discuss the concept of "Soft Robotics" and follow up on its far-reaching implications. First, it will be shown that, because morphological and material characteristics provide a lot of the functionality of such systems, an entirely new notion of control is required. Second, I will demonstrate how the physical dynamics of an embodied agent is directly coupled to the information processing of its brain (or more generally its control). It turns out that this coupling is fundamental for learning and for the development of cognition in general. And third, I will argue that, although many challenges remain, these concepts will enable researchers to engineer machines for the real world that possess at least some of the desirable properties of biological organisms, such as adaptivity, robustness, and versatility. All points will be illustrated with many examples from robotics and biology.

Short Biography

    Rolf Pfeifer received his master’s degree in physics and mathematics and his Ph.D. in computer science from the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (ETH) in Zurich, Switzerland. He spent three years as a post-doctoral fellow at Carnegie-MellonUniversity and at YaleUniversity in the US. Since 1987 he has been a professor of computer science at the Department of Informatics, University of Zurich, and director of the Artificial Intelligence Laboratory. Having worked as a visiting professor and research fellow at the Free University of Brussels, the MIT Artificial Intelligence Laboratory in Cambridge, Mass., the Neurosciences Institute (NSI) in San Diego, the Beijing Open Laboratory for Cognitive Science, and the Sony Computer Science Laboratory in Paris, he was elected "21st Century COE Professor, Information Science and Technology" at the University of Tokyo. In 2009 he was also a visiting professor at the Suola Superiore Sant'Anna in Pisa, at ShanghaiJiaoTongUniversity in China, and he was appointed "Fellow of the School of Engineering" at the University of Tokyo. His research interests are in the areas of embodiment, biorobotics, artificial evolution and morphogenesis, modular robotics, self-assembly and educational technology. He is the author of the book "Understanding Intelligence", MIT Press, 1999 (with C. Scheier) and "How the body shapes the way we think: a new view of intelligence," 2007 (with Josh Bongard) MIT Press (popular science style).  Next project: “The ShanghAI Lectures 1.1 (building on Shanghai 1.0 in 2009)”, a global mixed-reality lecture series on embodied intelligence, broadcast this time from the University of Zurich in Switzerland in cooperation with universities from around the globe (fall term 2010, starting Thursday, 30 September 2010).

Abstract

    Willow Garage is an unusual company set up to make robots help people. Human-scale "personal robots" will perform tasks in natural human environments, ranging from helping around the home to assisting in flexible manufacturing.  Willow Garage's role has been to help accelerate progress in this field.  The PR2 robot combined with the open source Robot Operating System (ROS) enables researchers to more quickly explore applications of personal robots.  This robotics platform is designed to be robust an extensible, and has already enabled significant new capabilities, ranging from simple core actions such as navigating and plugging in to sophisticated tasks like folding towels and playing billiards.  This talk will give the status of ROS and the PR2 Beta program.

Short Biography

    Steve Cousins is the President and CEO of Willow Garage.  He earned his PhD in Computer Science at Stanford University.  He has experience as a researcher and manager in both academic and industrial research labs, from the Washington University medical school and Stanford University, to Interval Research Corporation, Xerox PARC, and IBM Almaden.

 8:20-9:20, Thursday, October 21, 2010

Robot Suit HAL (Hybrid Assistive Limb) and Cybernics Medicare System

Prof. Yoshiyuki Sankai
Department of System & Information Engineering
University of Tsukuba,  Japan
(Lab web page: http://sanlab.kz.tsukuba.ac.jp/english/)

Abstract

    Cybernics is a new domain of interdisciplinary academic field of human-assistive technology to enhance, strengthen, and support human's cognitive and physical functions, which challenges to integrate and harmonize humans and robots (RT: robotics technology) with the basis of information technology (IT) in a functional, organic, and social manner. We aim to develop the frontier science Cybernics, which is centered on cybernetics, mechatronics, and informatics, and it challenges to integrate neuroscience, robotics, systems engineering, information technology, "kansei" engineering, ergonomics, physiology, social science, law, ethics, management. The goal of the Program represents a Grand Challenge that makes breakthroughs in the innovative creation and fusion of forefront researches based on information science. A pioneering achievement of Cybernics is Robot Suit HAL (Hybrid Assistive Limbs) developed by Yoshiyuki Sankai. HAL is the world’s first cyborg type robot that enhances and strengthens the limb motion of human bodies by detecting the weak bioelectrical signal through the body from the brain which generates the nerve signal to control the musculoskeletal system. In this talk, I will deliver the outline Cybernics approach based on our experienced and introduce the work performed in Cybernics. And, I may present what we have done related in this fields and advanced Cybernics Medicare System. 

Short Biography

   Yoshiyuki Sankai, Tsukuba University Professor and president of the robotic venture Cyberdyne displays the newly developed robot-suit "HAL" (Hybrid Assistive Limb), produced by Cyberdyne at the company's new R and D center at Tsukuba.