1000 Olin Way
Franklin W. Olin College of Engineering, Needham, MA 02492
USA
Tuesday, October 14, 2014
Doors open: 6:00 P.M.
Election Discussion & Nominations Open: 6:20 P.M.
Presentation: 6:30 P.M.
Dinner: 8:00 P.M.
Olin College
1000 Olin Way
Needham, MA 02492
Milas Hall Auditorium
Agenda
Discussion of Boston Area IEEE Robotics & Automation Society Election & Opening of Nominations: 6:20 P.M.
Main Presentation: 6:30 P.M.
The Boston Area IEEE Robotics & Automation Society needs willing IEEE R&AS members to contribute to the chapter by stepping up into leadership positions, to help run & maintain the chapter! If there are presentations you would like to see, or would like to help the chapter arrange, joining the leadership of the chapter is the best way!
Positions up for Election:
Chair – Requires a Boston Area IEEE Robotics & Automation Society Chapter member in good standing
Vice-Chair – Requires a Boston Area IEEE Robotics & Automation Society Chapter member in good standing
Secretary – Requires a Boston Area IEEE Robotics & Automation Society Chapter member in good standing
Webmaster – Anyone, but experience preferred
Volunteer positions available in the Steering Committee
Opportunity to make nominations open on October 14th, and will remain open until the end of November. The election will take place at our December Social.
For questions about participating in organization of the chapter, please contact the Chapter Chair, Andy Vidan, or Vice-Chair, Ryan Pettigrew:
Chair: Andy Vidan chair@robotics-boston.org
Vice-Chair: Ryan Pettigrew: vice-chair@robotics-boston.org
TITLE & SPEAKER
Title: Getting a Grasp on Robot Hands
Presented by
Leif Jentoft
Summary
Robot hands are finally moving from the lab to the real world. While narrow-purpose end-effectors have been used in factories for decades, it has been challenging to design versatile hands that can grasp a range of objects. In this talk, we present new developments in hand design from the DARPA Autonomous Robotic Manipulation Program – Hardware Track. These hands are based on a new class of sensitive, low-cost tactile sensors combined with passive mechanisms that simplify the grasping process. This provides the ability to grasp a wide range of objects without precise perception or tedious object-specific parameter tuning.
Video here
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_0JYQJC3vAY
SPEAKER’S BIOGRAPHY
Leif Jentoft
Leif Jentoft received his PhD from the Biorobotics Lab at Harvard in 2014, and his B.S. from Olin College in 2009. He is interested in problems that lie on the intersection between technology and application (Pasteur’s Quadrant), especially ways to make robots less expensive and more useful for messy real-world tasks. He was a member of the iRobot/Harvard/Yale team for the DARPA Autonomous Robotic Manipulation program, and is one of three co-founders at RightHand Robotics, which is developing flexible grasping solutions to enable robots to autonomously handle individual items for logistics and manufacturing.
UNHOSTED DINNER
Bertucci’s
1257 Highland Ave.,
Needham, MA 02492
Have more questions? Want to share a drink with the speaker? Want to network with fellow engineers and professionals? Just want to chat about the current goings-on in Robotics, or technology in general? Join us for dinner, where you can talk about Robotics in a more casual setting!
GENERAL INFORMATION
This and other RAS meetings are open to the general public. For more information about the RAS Boston Chapter, contact Chapter Chair Andy Vidan at chair@robotics-boston.org or visit http://www.robotics-boston.org/.