All posts by Audrow Nash

In this episode, Audrow Nash interviews Dor Skuler, CEO and co-founder of Intuition Robotics, about a socially assistive robot for older adults named ElliQ. Skuler discusses the motivation for ElliQ, how it infers context and changes its behavior accordingly, and how ElliQ adapts its behavior over time.

Below is a video that shows what interactions with ElliQ look like.

Dor Skuler

Dor Skuler has co-founded five ventures, the most recent being Intuition Robotics. Skuler holds an MBA and Master’s of Science in Marketing from Temple University, has co-authored ‘Cloud Computing: Business Trends and Technologies’ published by Wiley in 2016 and holds board level advisory and director roles for several telecoms, cyber security and tech-led social impact ventures.

Links

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In this episode, Audrow Nash interviews Amy Loutfi, a professor at Örebro University, about how semantic representations can be used to help robots reason about the world.  Loutfi discusses semantics in general, as well as how semantics have been used for a simulated quad rotor to do path planning within constraints.

Amy Loutfi

Amy Loutfi is head of the Center for Applied Autonomous Sensor Systems (www.aass.oru.se) at Örebro University. She is also a professor in Information Technology at Örebro University. She received her Ph.d in Computer Science with a focus on the integration of artificial olfaction on robotic and intelligent systems. She currently leads one of the labs at the Center, the machine perception and interaction lab (www.mpi.aass.oru.se). Her general interests are in the area of integration of artificial intelligence with autonomous systems, and over the years has looked into applications where robots closely interact with humans in both industry and domestic environments.

Links

• Download mp3 (13.8 MB)
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In this interview, Audrow Nash interviews Jaime Fernández Fisac, a PhD student at University of California, Berkeley, in Anca Dragan’s InterACT Lab. Fisac is interested in ensuring that autonomous systems such as self-driving cars, delivery drones, and home robots can operate and learn in the world—while satisfying safety constraints. Towards this goal, Fisac discusses different examples of his work with unmanned aerial vehicles and talks about safe robot learning in general; including, the curse of dimensionality and how it impacts control problems (including how some systems can be decomposed into simpler control problems), how simulation can be leveraged before trying learning on a physical robot, safe sets, and how a robot can modify its behavior based on how confident it is that its model is correct.

Below are two videos of work that was discussed during the interview.  The top video is on a framework for learning-based control, and the bottom video discusses adjusting the robot’s confidence about a human’s actions based on how predictably the human is behaving.

Jaime Fernández Fisac

Jaime Fernández Fisac is a final-year Ph.D. candidate in Electrical Engineering and Computer Sciences at the University of California, Berkeley. He received a B.S./M.S. degree in Electrical Engineering from the Universidad Politécnica de Madrid, Spain, in 2012, and a M.Sc. in Aeronautics from Cranfield University, U.K., in 2013. He is a recipient of the La Caixa Foundation fellowship. His research interests lie between control theory and artificial intelligence, with a focus on safety assurance for autonomous systems. He works to enable AI systems to reason explicitly about the gap between their models and the real world, so that they can safely interact with uncertain environments and human beings, even under inaccurate assumptions.

Links

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• Jaime Fernández Fisac’s website
• InterACT Lab
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In this interview, Audrow Nash interviews Ryan Gariepy, Lars Grimstad, and Péter Fankhauser.

Ryan Gariepy, Chief Technology Officer of ClearPath and Otto Motors in Canada, speaks about Boxer, a robust research platform that has been used extensively in an industrial context over many years. Gariepy discusses how Boxer can be used in investigating human-robot interaction questions because of its expressive lighting, including for autonomous cars.

Lars Grimstad, Chief Technology Office of Saga Robotics in Norway, discusses a lego-like agriculture platform. He speaks about the platform’s design, including its power systems and communication protocol. Grimstad also talks about a project using this platform to pick hanging strawberries.

Péter Fankhauser, Chief Business Development Officer and Co-founder of ANYbotics in Switzerland, speaks about ANYmal, a quadrupedal robot. Fankhauer discusses going from research to industry, using ANYmal for inspection, and the future of ANYbotics.

Links

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In this episode, Audrow Nash interviews Pauline Pound, Philippe Morere, and Yujung Liu about the work they presented at the 2018 International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS) in Madrid, Spain.

Pauline Pounds, Associate Professor at the University of Queensland, speaks about building robots that can endure children.  She discusses the tradeoffs of designing a robot that can survive children and cannot harm the children. Pounds talks about how the robot has performed with children so far, the hardware design, and her future direction with this work.

Philippe Morere, a PhD student at University of Sydney, speaks about reinforcement learning in partially observable environments.  Morere discusses the intuition behind this work and the problems that he solved using this approach.

Yujung Liu, a master’s student from the National Taiwan University, speaks about a painting robot.  He discusses how the portrait is constructed, including how colors are chosen, how the features are made cartoon-like, and his future direction.

Links

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In this interview, Audrow Nash interviews Kristoffer Richardsson, Michael Zillich, and Paulo Alvito.

Kristoffer Richardsson, Developer at Bitcraze in Sweden, speaks about small open-source unmanned aerial vehicle and different ways of localizing them.

Michael Zillich, CTO of Blue Danube Robotics in Austria, discusses a robotics platform for picking up toys, called Kenny. Zillich talks about Kenny’s design, including sensors and its robotic arm. He discusses how children can show the robot where to put specific toys, about how this large European project was coordinated, and about possibly commercializing this platform.

Paulo Alvito, CEO and CTO and Co-founder of IDMind in Portugal, discusses remote inspection robot for sewers. Alvito discusses what it means to be remotely autonomous, the design of the robot, and how these robots communicate data.

Links

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In this episode, Audrow Nash interviews Robert Lösch, Ali Marjovi, and Sophia Sakr about the work they presented at the 2018 International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS) in Madrid, Spain.

Robert Lösch is a PhD Student at Technische Universität Bergakademie Freiberg (TU Freiberg) in Germany, and he speaks on an approach to have robots navigate mining environments. Lösch discusses the challenges of operating in mines, such as humidity and wireless communication, his current platform, as well as future work.

Ali Marjovi is a Post doc at the École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL) in Switzerland, and he speaks about on how robots could be used to localize odors, which could be useful for finding explosives or for search-and-rescue. Marjovi discusses how odor localization works, his experimental setup, the challenges of odor localization, and on giving robots a sense of smell.

Sophia Sakr, from Institut des Systèmes Intelligents et de Robotique (ISIR) in France, speaks about a haptic pair of tweezers (designed by Thomas Daunizeau).  She discusses how it works, how this can be used to control other devices, and the future direction of her work.

Links

• Download mp3 (11.7 MB)
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In this interview, Audrow Nash interviews Gabriel Lopes, Robot and Control Scientist at Robot Care Systems, and Bernt Børnich, CEO and Co-founder of Halodi Robotics.

Gabriel Lopes speaks about an assistive walker with additional functionality.  Lopes discusses how the walker can be used, including driving up to the person, helping them stand up, exercise, and make video calls.  He also discusses building a software language for non-technical people that work with older adults. Lopes also speaks about the future of their company.

Bernt Børnich speaks about the humanoid platform at Halodi Robotics. Børnich’s long-term goal is to create an affordable home robot. He discusses the design and form factor of this robot. This includes the custom motor designed for high torque, and how the robot can “lean in” from a joint at its ankle. Børnich discusses the timeline, speculated cost, and working with investors on the long term goal of building an affordable humanoid robot.

Links

• Download mp3 (13.6 MB)
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In this episode, Audrow Nash interviews Alexandros Kogkas, Katie Driggs-Campbell, and Martin Karlsson about the work they presented at the 2018 International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS) in Madrid, Spain.

Alexandros Kogkas is a PhD Candidate at the Imperial College London and he speaks about an eye tracking framework to understand where a person is looking.  This framework can be used to understand a person’s intentions, for example to hand a surgeon the correct tool or helping a person who is paraplegic.   Kogkas discusses how the framework works, possible applications, and his future plans for this framework.

Katie Driggs-Campbell is a Post Doctoral Researcher at Stanford’s Intelligent System Laboratory and is—soon to be—an Assistant Professor at University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign (UIUC). She speaks about making inferences about the world from human actions, specifically in the context of autonomous cars.  In the work she discusses, they use a model of a human driver that they use infer what is happening in the world, for example a human using a crosswalk. Driggs-Campbell talks about how they evaluate this work.

Martin Karlsson is a PhD student at Lund University in Sweden, and he speaks about a haptic interface to mirror robotic arms that requires no force sensing.  He discusses a feedback law that allows a mirroring of forces and his future work to deal with joint friction.

Links

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In this episode, Audrow Nash interviews Caitlyn Clabaugh, PhD Candidate at the University of Southern California, about lessons learned about putting robots in people’s homes for human-robot interaction research.  Clabaugh speaks about her work to date, the expectations in human-subjects research, and gives general advice for PhD students.

Caitlyn Clabaugh

Caitlyn Clabaugh is a PhD student in Computer Science at the University of Southern California, co-advised by Prof. Maja J Matarić and Prof. Fei Sha, and supported by a graduate research assistantship in the Interaction Lab. She received my B.A. in Computer Science from Bryn Mawr College in May 2013. Her primary research interest is the application of machine learning and statistical methods to support long-term adaptation and personalization in socially assistive robot tutors, specifically for young children and early childhood STEM.

Links

• Interaction Lab
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• Download MP3 (26.7 MB)

In this episode, Audrow Nash interviews Patrick Tresset, a London based artist, on robots that draw people using a pen and paper in a way that is similar to the drawing process for humans. Tresset discusses his background in painting and programming, how his robot artists work, how he creates an experience for the person being drawn by the robots, about art history with robots, and about his future direction with robot artists.

Patrick Tresset

Patrick Tresset is a London based artist who develops and presents theatrical installations with robotic agents as actors which are evocations of humanness. Tresset’s installations use computational systems that introduce artistic, expressive and obsessive aspects to robots’ behaviour. These systems are influenced by research into human behaviour, more specifically how artists make marks that depict how humans perceive artworks and how humans relate to robots. Tresset  develops robots and autonomous computational systems to produce series of drawings, paintings and animations.

Tresset’s work has been exhibited in association with major museums and institutions such as The Pompidou Center, Museum of Israel, Victoria & Albert Museum (London), Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art (Seoul), BOZAR (Brussels), Prada Foundation (Milan) and at events such as Ars Electronica, Update_5, WRO2015, Merge festival.

Links

• Download mp3 (12.2 MB)
• Patrick Tresset’s homepage
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In this episode, Audrow Nash interviews Robert Williamson, a Professor at the Australian National University, who speaks about a mathematical approach to ethics. This approach can get us started implementing robots that behave ethically. Williamson goes through his logical derivation of a mathematical formulation of ethics and then talks about the cost of fairness. In making his derivation, he relates bureaucracy to an algorithm. He wraps up by talking about how to work ethically.

Robert Williamson

Robert (Bob) Williamson is a professor in the research school of computer science at Australian National University. Until recently he was the chief scientist of DATA61, where he continues as a distinguished researcher. He served as scientific director and (briefly) CEO of NICTA, and lead its machine learning research group. His research is focussed on machine learning. He is the lead author of the ACOLA report Technology and Australia’s Future. He obtained his PhD in electrical engineering from the university of Queensland in 1990. He is a fellow of the Australian Academy of Science.

Links

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In this interview, Audrow Nash interviews Amruta Moktali, VP of Product Management at Salesforce Analytics, about Salesforce Analytics’ analytic and artificial intelligence software. Moktali discusses the data-pipeline, how data is processed (e.g., noise), and how insights are identified.  She also talks about how dimensions in the data can be controlled for (such as race, gender, or zip-code) to avoid bias and how other dimensions can be selected as actionable so Salesforce can make recommendations—and how they use interpretable methods so that these recommendations can be explained.  Moktali also tells about her professional path, including going from computer engineering and computer science to product management and her experience with intrapreneurship (that is, starting an endeavor within a large organization).

Here is a video demo of Einstein Analytics, and you can watch Moktali’s live in the Einstein Analytics keynote at Dreamforce on Thursday, Sept. 27 at 5pm PT at salesforce.com/live and youtube.com/user/dreamforce.

Amruta Moktali
Amruta Moktali, VP of Product Management for Salesforce Analytics, has spent 10+ years immersed in the data and analytics side of popular products. Before Salesforce, she was head of product at Topsy Labs, the social search and analytics company, where her team pinpointed the catalyst tweets that initiated the Arab Spring in Egypt. Topsy was acquired by Apple and is now part of Apple Search technology. Prior to that she worked at Microsoft where she worked on several products including Bing, which she had a hand in shaping with the Powerset team. She earned her bachelor’s degree in computer engineering at Maharaja Sayajirao University in India, and her master’s in computer science at Arizona State University.

Links

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In this episode, Audrow Nash interview Magnus Egerstedt, Professor at the Georgia Institute of Technology, about a way for anyone interested in swarm robotics to test their ideas on hardware, called the Robotarium.  The Robotarium is a 725-square-foot lab at the the Georgia Institute of Technology that houses nearly 100 rolling and flying robots.  To test their ideas, people can write their own programs, upload them to the Robotarium, and then watch the machines carry out their commands.

In this interview, Egerstedt speaks about the kinds of robots used in the Robotarium, design decisions in making the Robotarium, the differences between doing research in simulation and on hardware, and about lessons learnt and the challenges of building the Robotarium.

Magnus Egerstedt

Dr. Magnus Egerstedt is the Steve W. Chaddick School Chair and Professor in the School of Electrical and Computer Engineering at the Georgia Institute of Technology. He holds secondary appointments in the Woodruff School of Mechanical Engineering, the School of Interactive Computing, and the Guggenheim School of Aerospace Engineering, and has previously served as the Executive Director for the Institute for Robotics and Intelligent Machines at Georgia Tech. He received the M.S. degree in Engineering Physics and the Ph.D. degree in Applied Mathematics from the Royal Institute of Technology, Stockholm, Sweden, the B.A. degree in Philosophy from Stockholm University, and was a Postdoctoral Scholar at Harvard University. Dr. Egerstedt conducts research in the areas of control theory and robotics, with particular focus on control and coordination of complex networks, such as multi-robot systems, mobile sensor networks, and cyber-physical systems. Magnus Egerstedt is a Fellow of the IEEE and has received a number of teaching and research awards, including the Ragazzini Award from the American Automatic Control Council, the Outstanding Doctoral Advisor Award and the HKN Outstanding Teacher Award from Georgia Tech, the Alumni of the Year Award from the Royal Institute of Technology, and the CAREER Award from the U.S. National Science Foundation.

Links

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• GRITS Lab
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In this episode, Audrow Nash interviews Juxi Leitner, a Postdoctoral Research Fellow at QUT; and Nicholas Panitz, Ben Wilson, and James Brett, from CSIRO.

Leitner speaks about the Amazon Picking challenge, a challenge to advance the state of robotic grasping, and their robot which won the challenge in 2017. Their robot is similar to a cartesian 3D printer in form and uses either a suction cup or a pinch gripper for grabbing objects. Their robot has a depth camera and uses a digital scale to determine if an object has been picked up successfully. Leitner discusses what their team did differently from other teams that helped them win the competition.

Panitz, Wilson, and Brett speak about their hexapod robots. Their hexapods are for several purposes, such as environmental monitoring and remote inspection. They choose to use hexapods because they are statically stable. They discuss the design of their hexapods and how research works at Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization, or CSIRO.

A video of the robot Leitner discusses, #Cartman:

An example of CSIRO’s hexapod robots for inspection:

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