It was a return to the source for RoboCup 2017, which took place last week in Nagoya Japan, 20 years after its launch in the same city.
Bigger than ever, the competition brought together roboticists from around the world. Originally focussed on robot football matches, RoboCup has expanded to include leagues for rescue robots, industrial robots, and robots in the home. Kids are also part of the fun, competing in their own matches and creative shows. You can watch video introductions of all of the leagues here, or watch a quick summary below.
And here’s a scroll through 5 hours of football glory from this year’s competition.
Mike Salem from Udacity’s Robotics Nanodegree is hosting a series of interviews with professional roboticists as part of their free online material.
This week we’re featuring Mike’s interview with Nick Kohut, Co-Founder and CEO of Dash Robotics.
Nick is a former robotics postdoc at Stanford and received his PhD in Control Systems from UC Berkeley. At Dash Robotics, Nick handles team-building and project management.
You can find all the interviews here. We’ll be posting one per week on Robohub.
RoboCup is an international scientific initiative with the goal to advance the state of the art of intelligent robots. Established in 1997, the original mission was to field a team of robots capable of winning against the human soccer World Cup champions by 2050.
To celebrate 20 years of RoboCup, the Federation is launching a video series featuring each of the leagues with one short video for those who just want a taster, and one long video for the full story. Robohub will be featuring one league every week leading up to RoboCup 2017 in Nagoya, Japan.
In our final set of videos, we are featuring the RoboCupJunior league! RoboCupJunior is a project-oriented educational initiative that sponsors local, regional and international robotic events for young students. It is designed to introduce RoboCup to primary and secondary school children, as well as undergraduates who do not have the resources to get involved in the senior leagues yet.
Short version:
Long version:
You can view all the videos on the RoboCup playlist below:
RoboCup is an international scientific initiative with the goal to advance the state of the art of intelligent robots. Established in 1997, the original mission was to field a team of robots capable of winning against the human soccer World Cup champions by 2050.
To celebrate 20 years of RoboCup, the Federation is launching a video series featuring each of the leagues with one short video for those who just want a taster, and one long video for the full story. Robohub will be featuring one league every week leading up to RoboCup 2017 in Nagoya, Japan.
This week, we consider being part of the RoboCupIndustrial league. RoboCupIndustrial is a competition between industrial mobile robots focusing on logistics and warehousing systems. In anticipation of Industry 4.0, participants compete in automation through robots, autonomous systems, and mobile robot technology. You’ll hear about the history and ambitions of RoboCup from the trustees, and inspiring teams from around the world.
Short version:
Long version:
Want to watch the rest? You can view all the videos on the RoboCup playlist below:
The world’s brightest minds in Artificial Intelligence (AI) and humanitarian action will meet with industry leaders and academia at the AI for Good Global Summit, 7-9 June 2017, to discuss how AI will assist global efforts to address poverty, hunger, education, healthcare and the protection of our environment. The event will in parallel explore means to ensure the safe, ethical development of AI, protecting against unintended consequences of advances in AI.
The event is co-organized by ITU and the XPRIZE Foundation, in partnership with 20 other United Nations (UN) agencies, and with the participation of more than 70 leading companies and academic and research institutes.
“Artificial Intelligence has the potential to accelerate progress towards a dignified life, in peace and prosperity, for all people,” said UN Secretary-General António Guterres. “The time has arrived for all of us – governments, industry and civil society – to consider how AI will affect our future. The AI for Good Global Summit represents the beginnings of our efforts to ensure that AI charts a course that will benefit all of humanity.”
The AI for Good Global Summit will emphasize AI’s potential to contribute to the pursuit of the UN Sustainable Development Goals.
Opening sessions will share expert insight into the state of play in AI, with leading minds in AI giving voice to their greatest ambitions in driving AI towards social good. ‘Breakthrough’ sessions will propose strategies for the development of AI applications and systems able to promote sustainable living, reduce poverty and deliver citizen-centric public services.
“Today, we’ve gathered here to discuss how far AI can go, how much it will improve our lives, and how we can all work together to make it a force for good,” said ITU Secretary-General Houlin Zhao. “This event will assist us in determining how the UN, ITU and other UN Agencies can work together with industry and the academic community to promote AI innovation and create a good environment for the development of artificial intelligence.”
“The AI for Good Global Summit has assembled an impressive, diverse ecosystem of thought leaders who recognize the opportunity to use AI to solve some of the world’s grandest challenges,” said Marcus Shingles, CEO of the XPRIZE Foundation. “We look forward to this Summit providing a unique opportunity for international dialogue and collaboration that will ideally start to pave the path forward for a new future of problem solvers working with XPRIZE and beyond.”
The AI for Good Global Summit will be broadcast globally as well as captioned to ensure accessibility.
RoboCup is an international scientific initiative with the goal to advance the state of the art of intelligent robots. Established in 1997, the original mission was to field a team of robots capable of winning against the human soccer World Cup champions by 2050.
To celebrate 20 years of RoboCup, the Federation is launching a video series featuring each of the leagues with one short video for those who just want a taster, and one long video for the full story. Robohub will be featuring one league every week leading up to RoboCup 2017 in Nagoya, Japan.
This week, we consider being part of the RoboCup@Home league. Robots helping at home can certainly ‘feel’ like the future. One day, these robots might help with various tasks around the house. You’ll hear about the history and ambitions of RoboCup from the trustees, and inspiring teams from around the world.
Short version:
Long version:
Want to watch the rest? You can view all the videos on the RoboCup playlist below:
RoboCup is an international scientific initiative with the goal to advance the state of the art of intelligent robots. Established in 1997, the original mission was to field a team of robots capable of winning against the human soccer World Cup champions by 2050.
To celebrate 20 years of RoboCup, the Federation is launching a video series featuring each of the leagues with one short video for those who just want a taster, and one long video for the full story. Robohub will be featuring one league every week leading up to RoboCup 2017 in Nagoya, Japan.
Robotics isn’t only about playing soccer it’s also about helping people. This week, we take a look at what it takes to be part of RoboCupRescue. You’ll hear about the history and ambitions of RoboCup from the trustees, and inspiring teams from around the world.
Short version:
Long version:
Can’t wait to watch the rest? You can view all the videos on the RoboCup playlist below:
The conference theme, “Innovation, Entrepreneurship, and Real-world Solutions”, underscores the need for innovative R&D talent, dynamic and goal-driven entrepreneurs and practitioners using robotics and automation technology to solve challenging real-world problems such as shortage of labour, an ageing society, and creating sustainable environments.
There will also be four Robot Challenges to take place on 30-31 May:
DJI RoboMaster Mobile Manipulation Challengeis a ground robot challenge that examines the application and competence of technologies that include positioning, object grasping, force control, target identification, and system stability.
TheMobile Microrobotics Challenge 2017in which microrobots on the order of the diameter of a human hair face off in tests of autonomy, accuracy, and assembly.
Soft Material Robot Challengeaims to promote research in the field of soft robotics and applicability to on‐field competence.
Workshops & Tutorials
25 workshop/tutorial sessions are available for junior researchers. The sessions are to provide interaction and foster collaboration between young researchers, with the opportunity to listen to, and closely interact, with senior experts. The next set of workshops will be on Friday, 2 June.
Special sessions on Emerging Robotics Technology
This year, ICRA 2017 has invited robot experts to share the recent technological advancement in the field of robotics. These special sessions will focus on novel and creative approaches in designing or developing robots for automation, medical or surgical tasks, and space exploratory mission. The event will be held on Tuesday, 30 May.
Audrow will be on site interviewing for upcoming Robots Podcasts; check back for the latest coverage and highlights!
RoboCup is an international scientific initiative with the goal to advance the state of the art of intelligent robots. Established in 1997, the original mission was to field a team of robots capable of winning against the human soccer World Cup champions by 2050.
To celebrate 20 years of RoboCup, the Federation is launching a video series featuring each of the leagues with one short video for those who just want a taster, and one long video for the full story. Robohub will be featuring one league every week leading up to RoboCup 2017 in Nagoya, Japan.
This week, we take a look at the heart-pumping excitement watching the popular RoboCup soccer leagues. You’ll hear about the history and ambitions of RoboCup from the trustees, and inspiring teams from around the world.
Short version:
Long video:
Can’t wait to watch the rest? You can view all the videos on the RoboCup playlist below:
In a three-year competition, five international teams competed to develop a robot for routine-, inspection- and emergency operations on oil & gas sites. Frequently, gas leaks on oil drilling rigs can cause an increased risk to safety and the environment.
The acronym ARGOS stands for Autonomous Robot for Gas and Oil Sites, which suggests that the robot independently performs assigned tasks. If necessary, an operator can intervene at any time via a satellite-based connection from land and take control of the robot.
Photo credit: taurob GmbH and TU Darmstadt
The robot, developed by taurob GmbH together with TU Darmstadt, can read pointer instruments, fill level displays as well as valve positions using cameras and laser scanners. It can measure temperatures and gas concentrations, detect abnormal noises, obstacles and people around them, and safely manoeuvre on wet stairs. Adverse environmental conditions such as heavy rain, extreme temperatures and wind speeds do not pose a problem.
“Our robot is also the first fully automated inspection robot in the world that can be used safely in a potentially explosive atmosphere,” says Dr Lukas Silberbauer, who together with his colleague Matthias Biegl, founded the company taurob in 2010. The reason behind it, the robot is already fully ATEX certified so that it doesn’t trigger an explosion while operating in potentially explosive gases.
The Austrian company could capitalize on their knowledge obtaining this certification during their first project: a robot for firefighters.
“When we heard about Total’s contest, we immediately realized that this would be a great opportunity for us,” says Matthias Biegl.
Total has announced that it will use the new robots starting from 2020 on its oil drilling rigs.
The project was supported by FFG (Österreichische Forschungsförderungsgesellschaft) in the context of EUROSTARS (Co-financed by the EU).
A record number of teams submitted beautiful robot-created artwork for the second year of this 5-year worldwide competition. In total, there were 38 teams from 10 countries who submitted 200 different artworks!
Winners were determined based on a combination of public voting (over 3000 people with a Facebook account), judges consisting of working artists, critics, and technologists, and by how well the team met the spirit of the competition—that is, to create something beautiful using a physical brush and robotics, and to share what they learned with others. Learn more about the goals of the contest and its rules here.
Teams are encouraged to hang on to their artwork as there will be a physical exhibition of robotic-created artwork following next year’s competition (Summer 2018). This exhibition, most likely in Seattle, WA, will showcase winners of the 2017 and 2018 competition. The goal is to test Andy Warhol’s theory that “You know it’s ART, when the check clears.”
… and now, for the team winners of the 2017 Robot Art Competition:
This project from Columbia shows a high level of skill with brushstrokes. This, along with some deep learning algorithms, produces some lovely paintings from sources or scratch. When they used a photograph as the source they were able to create plenty of variation from the original and using a fluid medium to produce an atmospheric and open-ended visual experience. Much of their work had a painterly and contemporary presentation.
2nd Place—$25,000—CMIT ReART, Kasetsart University (Thailand)
King Bhumibol Adulyadej, by CMIT ReArt
Artists program this robot brushstroke by stroke, using a haptic recording system that generates volumes of data about the position of the brush and the forces being exerted. When re-played, reART will generate a perfect reproduction of the original strokes. Haptic recording and playback allows for remarkably high-quality inkbrush drawings
One of the aspects of a success commercial artist is to know their market. In this case, the students chose to paint the popular and recently deceased Thai King and therefore were able to get many students to vote for their team.
Hunter 2017 (Deep Learning Abstract Portraiture), by CloudPainter
All of this teams offerings are important. They are aiming at an interpretation of the optical properties of oil paint and applying them to deep learning. Spontaneous paint, “mosaicing” of adjacent tones, layering effects and the graphical interplay between paint strokes of varying textures, are all hand/eye, deeply neurally sophisticated aspects of oil painting that this team is trying to evince together with a robot.
This team also won the $5,000 prize for technical contribution.
4th Place $6000—e-David—University of Konstanz (Germany)
Homage to Jackson Pollock, by e-David
Using software that enables a collaboration between a human artist and roboticist, e-David mimics closely the approach a human painter would work on the canvas. An accompanying academic paper goes into deep detail about their approach to the project.
5th Place $4000—JACKbDU—New York University Shanghai (China)
WWF, by JACKbDU
Clean lines, interesting abstractions, both familiar and abstract subjects made me appreciate the overall body. In particularly, purely from aesthetics, these were found to be most compelling.
6th Place $2000—HEARTalion—Halmstad University (Sweden)
MISERABLE, by HEARTalion
If this body of work was exhibited at a gallery and I was told that the artist aimed to capture emotion through color, composition, and textures—I would buy (says one of our professional judges). The bold brush strokes, cool or warm templates to match the emotional quality expressed, all made sense—but felt alive. Loved them.
Loved the composition of both of these pieces. Both pieces bring an emotive calm with just a few colors, technique, and simplicity. Gem-style optical sketch, intimate scale, good formal balance, medium application and value panels.
This project uses the precision of a robot to take crude brush dabs to astonishing levels. By incorporating 3d scans into its image generation, this bot operates with a complete understanding of its subject; much like a human painter would have someone sitting for them. The team was kind enough to publish their 3d models and source code, so others can learn from and build off of their work.
9th Place $2000—CARP—Worcester Polytechnic Institute (USA)
Geometry No1, by CARP
Very good line. Lots of space in this drawing and central form is simultaneously dense and traversable. Good architectural reference in clear tooling, but enlivened by sumo type or Franz Kline strokes. If the shapes can continue to be explored while maintaining the hand/machine balance, this will remain a strong venue.
Slightly synesthetic. Beautiful and balanced fusion of technical and handmade, crystalline and organic.
10th Place $2000—BABOT—Massachusetts Institute of Technology (USA)
People in Space, by BABOT
MIT’s BABOT was able to produce this and other inspiring vistas.
RoboCup is an international scientific initiative with the goal to advance the state of the art of intelligent robots. Established in 1997, the original mission was to field a team of robots capable of winning against the human soccer World Cup champions by 2050.
The competition has now grown into an international movement with a variety of leagues that go beyond soccer. Teams compete to make robots for rescue missions, the home, and industry. And it’s not just researchers, kids also have their own league. Last year, almost 3,000 participants and 1,200 robots competed.
To celebrate 20 years of RoboCup, the Federation is launching a video series featuring each of the leagues with one short video for those who just want a taster, and one long video for the full story. Robohub will be featuring one league every week leading up to RoboCup 2017 in Nagoya, Japan.
This week, we take a whirlwind tour of the RoboCup competition, spanning all the leagues. You’ll hear about the history and ambitions of RoboCup from the trustees, and inspiring teams from around the world.
Short Version
Long Version
Can’t wait to watch the rest? You can view all the videos on the RoboCup playlist below:
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLEfaZULTeP_-bqFvCLBWnOvFAgkHTWbWC
Please spread the word! and if you would like to join a team, check here for more information.
For the very first time, the 6th International Brain-Computer Interface (BCI) Meeting Series will offer free remote attendance, via live-stream.
Livestream will be available today, Monday 30 May, during the evening opening session at 19:30 PST, and tomorrow, Tuesday 31 May, during morning 9:30 PST and afternoon sessions, 13:30 and 14:30 PST respectively.
The BCI Meeting will open with the Once and Future BCI Session, featuring speakers: Eberhard Fetz, Emanuel Donchin, and Jonathan Wolpaw.
Tuesday morning will contain the State of BCI Symposium, with speakers: Nick Ramsey, Lee Miller, Donatella Mattia, Aaron Batista, and José del R. Millán. Tuesday afternoon will be the Virtual Forum of BCI Users and Selected Oral Presentations. The remainder of the BCI Meeting are poster sessions and workshops and cannot be experienced remotely.
You can read all papers submitted to the BCI meeting here.
Please pass the livestreaming link (http://bcisociety.org/livestream/) to anyone else who may be interested in remote participation at the 2016 BCI Meeting.
