Greater Boston Area Robotics and Mechatronics Research
Special Session
2020 IEEE/ASME International Conference on Advanced Intelligent Mechatronics (AIM 2020)
http://aim2020.org/
Greater Boston is one of the world's leading centers for robotics and mechatronics. Over 350 institutions, companies, and research labs in the region are actively engaged in research, education, and technological development in the areas of robotics and mechatronics. While AIM 2020 was planned to be held in Boston but now moves to a virtual event due to COVID-19 pandemic, this special session aims to help expose the wide range of robotics and mechatronics related activities and facilities in Greater Boston to the conference attendees as well as a broader audience worldwide. In this special session, invited speakers from Greater Boston who are driving and promoting the transformative advancement of robotics and mechatronics will unfold to us the central role of the region in leading the world on various key fronts of education, research, and innovation.
"Massachusetts is home to a dynamic and thriving robotics industry. The region’s leading robotic companies, academic research laboratories, policy makers and government organizations work closely together to spur the technology’s economic development through education, knowledge-sharing and relationship building."
https://www.massrobotics.org/project/ecosystem/
Invited Speakers
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Joyce is a Co-Founder and VP for Programs and Community at MassRobotics, the nation’s leading innovation hub for robotics and smart connected device start-ups (founded in 2015). MassRobotics brings together startups and existing technology organizations to nurture the next generation of talent and promote economic growth and innovation. Joyce promotes the New England’s Robotics Ecosystem and facilitates dialogue and partnership between Robotics companies, technologists, and academia, as well as the public and investors. She earned a BSEE from Cornell University and prior experience includes 14 years of civil service with NUWC as a Chief Scientist, Systems & Test Engineer and Sonar Systems Analyst, and 10 years at General Dynamics in Business Development and Engineering & Technical Resource Manager roles.
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Taskin Padir
Professor Robotics Director of Institute for Experiential Robotics Northeastern University |
Taskin Padir received his PhD and MS degrees in electrical and computer engineering from Purdue University. He is the Founding Director of the Institute for Experiential Robotics at Northeastern University, as well as the Director of Robotics and Intelligent Vehicles Research Laboratory (RIVeR Lab). His research interests include supervised autonomy for humanoid robots, shared autonomy for intelligent vehicles, and human-in-the-loop control systems with applications in exploration, disaster response, personalized in-home care, and nuclear decommissioning. His projects have been sponsored by NSF, NASA, DARPA, AFRL, and many industry partners. He led project teams for the NASA Sample Return Robot Centennial Challenge, SmartAmerica Challenge, and the DARPA Robotics Challenge. He presented at the Innovation on the Edge: Accelerating Solutions in the Fight Against Ebola event hosted by OSTP and USAID at the White House in 2015 and organized and hosted OSTP/NRI Workshop on Safety Robotics for Ebola Workers in 2014.
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Jing Xiao
Professor Computer Science Director of Robotics Engineering (RBE) Program Worcester Polytechnic Institute |
Jing Xiao received her Ph.D. degree in Computer, Information, and Control Engineering from the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor. She is the Deans' Excellence Professor, William B. Smith Distinguished Fellow in Robotics Engineering, Professor of Computer Science, and Director of the Robotics Engineering Program, Worcester Polytechnic Institute (WPI). She joined WPI from the University of North Carolina at Charlotte. Her research spans robotics, haptics, and intelligent systems. She has co-authored a monograph, holds one patent, and published extensively in major robotics journals, conferences, and books. She is the recipient of the 2015 Faculty Outstanding Research Award of the College of Computing and Informatics, University of North Carolina at Charlotte. Jing Xiao was named among 25 Women in Robotics You Need to Know About in 2015. Prof. Xiao is an IEEE Fellow.
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Holly Yanco
Professor Computer Science Director of New England Robotics Validation and Experimentation (NERVE) Center University of Massachusetts Lowell |
Holly Yanco received her PhD and MS degree in Computer Science from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. She was named Distinguished University Professor at the University of Massachusetts Lowell in 2015. Her research interests include human-robot interaction, multi-touch computing, interface design, robot autonomy, fostering trust of autonomous systems, evaluation methods for human-robot interaction, and the use of robots in K-12 education to broaden participation in computer science. Yanco's research has been funded by the National Science Foundation, the Army Research Office, DARPA, the Department of Energy’s Office of Environmental Management (DOE-EM), NIST, and Google. Yanco was the General Chair of the 2012 ACM/IEEE International Conference on Human-Robot Interaction. She served on the Executive Council of the Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence (AAAI) from 2006-2009. She is a senior member of AAAI.
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Presentations (Youtube) |
A Virtual Tour of MassRobotics (Joyce Sidopoulos)
INSPIRE. EMPOWER. CONNECT. MASSROBOTICS.
https://www.massrobotics.org/
We are an independent, non-profit organization serving as the innovation hub for robotics and connected devices. Through our programming and events, we help bring together innovative startups and existing technology organizations to nurture the next generation of talent, and promote economic growth and innovation. By working with diverse local talent, we are helping to bring about the next global evolution of robotics.
A Virtual Tour of WPI's Robotics Engineering Research (Dr. Jing Xiao)
(Also available on Vimeo: https://vimeo.com/434199259/d820a49320)
(Also available on Vimeo: https://vimeo.com/434199259/d820a49320)
WPI Robotics Engineering (RBE) Research
https://www.wpi.edu/academics/departments/robotics-engineering
Worcester Polytechnic Institute (WPI) is the first university in the nation to offer BS through PhD degrees in robotics, a highly interdisciplinary field. With the first-of-its-kind bachelor’s degree in robotics engineering and one of the first such graduate programs in the USA and in the world, WPI is at the forefront of robotics education and research.
Our passion for robotics is evident in everything we do—we have a dedicated and enthusiastic faculty and staff along with strong industry connections; perform breakthrough research; provide hands-on work with robotic devices in our many state-of-the-art labs; prioritize space for experimentation; and foster competitive teams that routinely win national robotics awards. Our graduates leave well prepared to tackle the technical, social, cultural, and ethical challenges of a robotics workforce that remains dynamic and constantly changing.
A Virtual Tour of UMass Lowell's NERVE Center (Dr. Holly Yanco)
The New England Robotics Validation and Experimentation (NERVE) Center at the University of Massachusetts Lowell is a dedicated research, testing, and training facility.
https://www.uml.edu/research/nerve/
The UMass Lowell NERVE Center is an interdisciplinary robotics testing, research, and training facility that evaluates robotic capabilities, human performance, and human-robot interaction. The mission of the NERVE Center is to improve the development of robot systems by enabling evaluation across many domains including industrial automation, exoskeletons and wearable robots, and disaster response.
The NERVE Center develops test methods and metrics for measuring robot capabilities, human performance, and human-robot interaction. Test and evaluation services are available on-site, in the field, and remotely. The NERVE Center can provide test apparatuses, sensors, data collection, personnel, logistics, and data analysis. Affiliated faculty include those from Computer Science, Mechanical Engineering, Physical Therapy, and Biomedical Engineering.
A Virtual Tour of NEU's Robotics Research (Dr. Taskin Padir)
The Institute for Experiential Robotics at the Northeastern University focuses on the development of robots able to learn and adaptively execute autonomous behaviors from human partners and/or other robots.
https://coe.northeastern.edu/coe-research/research-centers-institutes/institute-for-experiential-robotics/
Experiential robotics identifies and studies use-driven research problems at the intersection of collective human-robot experience, including: safe and reliable manipulation of tools and objects, machine learning for dexterous manipulation of novel objects; bilateral learning in human-robot interaction; robust inference of human intent; secure and resilient autonomous systems; adaptive robot navigation in human environments; and socioeconomic impact of collaborative robots on human work.
Experiential robotics addresses these interdisciplinary research questions to advance the capabilities of autonomous robots to perform everyday tasks in collaboration with humans. Widespread adoption of autonomous robots in a broad range of human environments relies on robust robot performance and robots’ ability to adapt to uncertainties inherent in everyday human experience, safety protocols, human comfort, and social factors.
