Collaborative Robotics in Practice: Opportunities and Challenges

Robotics and Automation Society

Collaborative Robotics in Practice: Opportunities, and Challenges

Collaborative robots that work in close coordination with humans in the same work environments have the potential to transform processes in many application areas including manufacturing, healthcare and logistics. This talk will provide an overview of our ongoing work in this area and discuss both opportunities and challenges to accelerate research and development in collaborative robotics.

Taskin Padir is an Associate Professor in the Electrical and Computer Engineering Department at Northeastern University. He received his PhD and MS degrees in electrical and computer engineering from Purdue University. He holds a BS in electrical and electronics engineering from the Middle East Technical University in Turkey. He is the Director of Robotics and Intelligent Vehicles Research Laboratory (RIVeR Lab). He is also the co-founder of the Robotics Collaborative at Northeastern. 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, DOE-EM, DARPA, Mass Seaport Economic Development Council and many industry partners. Professor Padir led project teams for the NASA Sample Return Robot Centennial Challenge, SmartAmerica Challenge and the DARPA Robotics Challenge (DRC). Padir currently leads one of two research groups selected by NASA to develop autonomy for humanoid robot Valkyrie.

Meeting Location: Room 140, Interdisciplinary Science and Engineering Complex, 805 Columbus Avenue, Boston