From illah at cs.cmu.edu  Thu Oct  1 11:15:10 2009
From: illah at cs.cmu.edu (Illah Nourbakhsh)
Date: Thu, 01 Oct 2009 14:15:10 -0400
Subject: [robotics-worldwide] Call for Papers: Community-Based Robotics
Message-ID: <4AC4F1AE.4050709@cs.cmu.edu>

Autonomous Robots Journal Special Issue Call for Papers:
Community-Based Robotics

Paper submission deadline: November 30, 2009

Illah Nourbakhsh, Associate Professor of Robotics
Robotics Institute, Carnegie Mellon University, illah at cmu.edu

Carl DiSalvo, Assistant Professor
School of Literature, Communication and Culture, Georgia Institute of
Technology

Kevin Crowley, Associate Professor
Learning Research and Development Center, University of Pittsburgh

The study of Human-Robot Interaction (HRI) has enabled researchers to
model human-robot systems with greater fidelity, and this in turn has
led to the development of reasoning, sensing and actuation modalities
for social robots that maximize the capability for effective one-on-one
interactions with humans in shared spaces.  But human interaction is not
limited to one-on-one encounters.  We live in and form communities based
on social practice, locale, goals and issues, which are different from
the workplace environments and groups common to HRI. Robots and robotic
technologies can have meaningful roles in human communities, supporting
social and situated learning, creativity, and civic engagement, as has
been demonstrated by projects as diverse as community-based educational
robotics programs, participatory design program with robotics, robot
exhibitions and installations, and arts-robotics fusion curricula.  Such
programs hint at the challenges of integrating robots into community
settings, but there is a need for focused research on community-based
robotics in order to systematically identify and address those
challenges and provide pathways for future research.

In this Autonomous Robots special issue on Community-based Robotics we
intend to outline recent advances in modeling, enabling and evaluating
the interaction of robotics with communities.  This topic is
interdisciplinary and so our focus spans fundamentally enabling research
as well as large-scale deployments and their formal evaluation:

    * Robot perception and reasoning for large-scale human interaction
    * Robotic curricula for educational communities
    * Role of robotics in community-based inquiry and action
    * Methods for mental modeling and evaluation of community-robot
      interaction
    * Methods for large-scale interaction of robots with untrained human
      groups
    * Design strategies for increasing public engagement with robot
      platforms
    * Evaluation rubrics for assessing public engagement with robots
    * Arts-based approaches to public encounters with robots

For more information please go to http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~illah/cbr or
contact the guest editors listed above.








From fosorio at icmc.usp.br  Thu Oct  1 17:08:26 2009
From: fosorio at icmc.usp.br (Fernando Santos Osorio)
Date: Thu, 1 Oct 2009 21:08:26 -0300 (BRT)
Subject: [robotics-worldwide] Last CFP: IEEE ICIT 2010 - Special Session
 "Mobile Robotics" (extended deadline)
Message-ID: <339d53e36e0d0385a850a3c0daab9392.squirrel@mail.icmc.usp.br>


LAST Call-for-Papers IEEE ICIT 2010
> Technical Tracks: Mechatronics and Robotics, and others
> Deadline: October 2
> TT: http://www.icit2010.usm.cl/Conference%20Theme.php

>> Special Session: Mobile Robotics
>> Deadline: October 9 (extended deadline)
>> SS: http://www.icit2010.usm.cl/Call%20for%20Special%20Sessions.php

--------------------------- Mensagem Original ----------------------------
Assunto: Deadline Extension
De:      "Maria Ines Valla" <mvalla at ing.unlp.edu.ar>
Data:    Ter, Setembro 29, 2009 11:08 am
--------------------------------------------------------------------------

Dear ICIT-2010 Special Sessions organizers,

          We have received several requests for a deadline
extension, so all the Special Sessions have been extended until
October 9th . This is already announced in the ICIT webpage.

Best regards

Luis Gomes and Maria Ines Valla
ICIT'2010 SS Co-Chairs

========================================================

>>                    IEEE-ICIT 2010                 <<
>> International Conference on Industrial Technology <<
>> 14-17 March 2010, Vi?a del Mar, Chile             <<
>> Conference WebSite: www.icit2010.usm.cl           <<
>>                                                   <<
>>        Special Session on MOBILE ROBOTICS         <<
>>                                                   <<
>>       http://www.icit2010.usm.cl/doc/SS11.pdf     <<

CALL FOR PAPERS

Robotics is a multidisciplinary area of study that presents
enormous commercial and research potential. While industrial
robotics covers the study, design, and use of robot systems
for manufacturing, mobile robotics concerns about developing
systems that are capable of making decisions and acting
autonomously in real and unpredictable environments
to accomplish determined tasks. In the last ten years,
technological advances made possible the development of very
efficient sensors and electronic devices at affordable prices.
This fact has great impact on robotics research, allowing
the development of efficient and relatively cheap sensors
and computing devices. It also allows robots to accomplish
more complex tasks, posing new challenges to scientists
and engineers. This session focuses on all aspects of
mobile robotics and intelligent systems, including related areas
and applications.

Papers on, but not limited to, the following topics are welcome:

+ Navigation
+ Motion Planning
+ Localization
+ Mapping
+ Multi-robot systems
+ Autonomous Vehicles
+ Aerial Robotics
+ Underwater Robotics
+ Humanoid Robotics
+ Rehabilitation Robotics
+ Micro/Nano Robotics
+ Assistive Technologies
+ Vision-based Control
+ Robotic Design
+ Swarm Robotics

The deadline and notification dates are published in
the conference webpage.

Deadline for Special Session Papers:
9 October 2009

Accepted papers will be published in an IEEE proceedings volume
and will be included in IEEE Xplore and indexed by EI Compendex.
In addition, selected papers will be invited for publication in the
IEEE Transaction on Industrial Electronics.

=====

*********************************************************
Prof. Maria Ines Valla
Member of the Buenos Aires Academy of Engineering
Associated Editor of the IEEE Transactions on Industrial Electronics
Senior AdCom Member of the Industrial Electronics Society
ARGENTINA
Phone/FAX: +54 221 425.9306
e-mail: m.i.valla at ieee.org
*********************************************************

--

 =================================================
 Prof. Dr. Fernando Santos Os?rio - ICMC / USP
 Research Group: http://www.icmc.usp.br/~lrm/
 =================================================



From emg at dei.unipd.it  Fri Oct  2 00:17:52 2009
From: emg at dei.unipd.it (Emanuele Menegatti)
Date: Fri, 2 Oct 2009 09:17:52 +0200
Subject: [robotics-worldwide] Call For Paper: 4th Workshop on Humanoid
	Soccer Robots (reminder)
Message-ID: <D90155CF-7F53-4AAE-943C-E29F0F11FED8@dei.unipd.it>

CALL for PAPERS

4th Workshop on Humanoid Soccer Robots

@ 2009 IEEE-RAS International Conference on Humanoid Robots

Paris (France), December 7, 2009

=========================

Year after year humanoid robots are more and more robust and  
autonomous. One of the fields with the most impressive advances is  
Humanoid Soccer Robotics. The ultimate goal of Humanoid Soccer  
Robotics is to develop a team of "humanoid soccer players" ? i.e.  
robots with human-like motion, intelligence, communication, and skills  
in playing soccer. This initiative is definitely posing a unique set  
of challenges to the researchers in robotics, AI and many other fields.

This workshop is open to contribution of all researchers interested in  
the subject. We warmly welcome contributions from the RoboCup and FIRA  
communities to foster the exchange of ideas and to promote robotic  
soccer in the IEEE community. This is the forth of a successful series  
of workshops held every year since 2006 at IEEE-RAS International  
Conference on Humanoid Robots. Previous workshops gave rise to special  
issues of international journals (IJHR, RAS) see http://www.humanoidsoccer.org/



Topics of interest for the workshop are:

	? Design and control of humanoid soccer robots

	? Biped locomotion
	? Complex motion generation for humanoids
	? Motion planning for humanoid soccer
	? 3D-Simulation for Humanoids
	? Perception for Humanoids
	? SLAM for Humanoids
	? Multi-humanoid systems
	? Humanoid team coordination
	? Moving from a quadruped robot to a biped robot in the RoboCup  
Standard Platform League


All the submissions will undergo a peer review process. All papers  
must be submitted electronically by sending it to the three Program  
Chairs, in PDF format by Octopber 10, 2009. The maximum number of  
pages is limited to eight, including figures. A CD-ROM with the  
accepted paper will be distributed at the Conference. After the  
workshop, the best papers will be selected for a robotics journal  
special issue as in the previous years.



Interested authors should send by e-mail a paper title, abstract and  
keywords to the Program Chairs, as soon as possible, and then they  
must submit the full paper according to the following deadlines.


IMPORTANT DATES:

Full paper submission  
due 
:                                                                                      October 
  10, 2009

Notification of acceptance by Workshop Co- 
Chairs:                                              October 30, 2009

Final paper  
due 
:                                                                                                       November 
  21st, 2009


General Co-Chairs
=======================
Enrico Pagello, University of Padua (Italy) E-mail: epv at dei.unipd.it
Changjiu Zhou, Singapore Polytechnic.  E-mail: zhoucj at sp.edu.sg

Program Co-Chairs:
======================
Sven Behnke, Rheinische Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universit?t Bonn (Germany)  
E-mail: behnke at cs.uni-bonn.de
Emanuele Menegatti, University of Padua (Italy) E-mail: emg at dei.unipd.it
Thomas R?fer, Universit?t Bremen    E-mail: Thomas.Roefer at dfki.de

Steering Committee
=======================
Minoru Asada, Osaka University, (Osaka, Japan)
Hans-Dieter Burkhard, Humboldt Universit?t (Berlin, Germany)
Hiroshi Ishiguro, Osaka University, (Osaka, Japan)
Manuela Veloso, Carnegie Mellon University (Pittsburgh, USA)

Program Committee
=======================

Heni Ben Amor, Technical University Bergakademie Freiberg, Germany

Jacky Baltes, Univ. of Manitoba,  Canada

Joschka Boedecker, Univ. of Osaka, Japan

Luca Iocchi, Univerista? La Sapienza, Italy

Pasan Kulvanit, King Mongkut's University of Technology Thonburi

Tim Laue, German Research Center for Artificial Intelligence, Germany

Djitt Laowattana, King  Mongkut's  Univ. of Technology, Thailand

Daniel Lee, University of Pennsylvania, USA

Norbert Michael Mayer, Osaka Univ., Japan

Chew Chee Meng, Univ. of  Singapore, Singapore

Oliver Obst,  CSIRO ICT Centre, Australia

Masaki Ogino, Osaka University

Michael Quinlan, University of Texas at Austin, USA

Javier Ruiz-del-Solar, Universidad de Chile

Vitor M.F. Santos, Univ. of  Aveiro, Portugal

Ching-Chang Wong, Tamkang  Univ., Taiwan











------------------------------------------
Emanuele Menegatti, Ph.D.

Intelligent Autonomous Systems Laboratory (IAS-Lab)
Department of Information Engineering
The University of Padua
via ognissanti 72
I-35129 Padova - ITALY

Skype: emanuele.menegatti
Phone: ++39 049 827 7840
FAX:  ++39 049 827 7826
http://www.dei.unipd.it/~emg
------------------------------------------




From jsabater at iiia.csic.es  Fri Oct  2 02:26:57 2009
From: jsabater at iiia.csic.es (Jordi Sabater Mir)
Date: Fri, 02 Oct 2009 11:26:57 +0200
Subject: [robotics-worldwide] [AAMAS 2010] Final call for Papers
Message-ID: <4AC5C761.5040801@iiia.csic.es>


----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 

                      Final Call for Papers-AAMAS 2010

The 9th International Conference on Agents and Multi Agent Systems
Conference: www.cse.yorku.ca/AAMAS2010/
Submissions: www.aamas2010.confmaster.net

Toronto, Canada

**** AAMAS 2010 has a special track on ROBOTICS (see bellow) ****

 Important dates:
Conference:                                      May 10 - 14, 2010
Electronic Abstract Submission:        October 8, 2009
Full Paper Submission:                     October 13, 2009
Author Notification:                            December 18, 2009

Collocated with KR2, NMR, ICAPS, FOIS, (all in Toronto) and DL 2010
(in Waterloo, Ontario, Canada)

SUBMISSION DETAILS

AAMAS-2010 seeks high-quality submissions of full papers, limited to 8
pages in length. Submissions will be rigorously peer reviewed and
evaluated on the basis of originality, soundness, significance,
presentation, understanding of the state of the art, and overall
quality of their technical contribution. Reviews will be double blind;
authors must avoid including anything that can be used to identify
them. Where submission is for full (8 page) papers only, in some
cases they may be accepted as 2 page extended abstracts For formatting
instructions and a list of keywords, please refer to the conference
page.

In addition to submissions in the main track, AAMAS is soliciting
papers in two special tracks on robotics, and on virtual agents (see
below). The review process for the special tracks will be the same as
for the main track, but with specially-selected program committee
members.

Special Track on Robotics (Chair: Michael Beetz):
Papers on theory and applications concerning single and multiple
robots will be welcome, namely those focusing on real robots
interacting with their surrounding environments. The goal is to foster
interaction between researchers on agent and robotics systems, so as
to provide a cradle for cross-fertilization of concepts from both
fields.

Special Track on Virtual Agents (Chair: Stacy Marsella):
Virtual agents are embodied agents in interactive virtual or physical
environments that emulate human-like behavior. We encourage papers on
the design, implementation, and evaluation of virtual agents as well
as challenging applications featuring them. The goal is to provide an
opportunity for interaction and cross-fertilization between the AAMAS
community and researchers working on virtual agents and to strengthen
links between the two communities.

ORGANIZING COMMITTEE

    General Chairs:  Michael Luck and Sandip Sen
    Program Chairs:  Wiebe van der Hoek and Gal A. Kaminka
    Local Organization Chair: Yves Lesperance

A list of the other members of the AAMAS-2010 Organizing Committee, a
list of Senior PC members
and an updated list of keywords may be found at
www.cse.yorku.ca/AAMAS2010/

 


From hanafiah at nuem.nagoya-u.ac.jp  Fri Oct  2 02:57:39 2009
From: hanafiah at nuem.nagoya-u.ac.jp (Hanafiah Yussof)
Date: Fri, 02 Oct 2009 18:57:39 +0900
Subject: [robotics-worldwide] [IRIS2010] Final Call for Papers
Message-ID: <200910020957.AA02645@P3C.nuem.nagoya-u.ac.jp>

[We apologize if you receive multiple copies of this email]

********************************************************************                       
                   Final Call for Papers
International Symposium on Robotics and Intelligent Sensors IRIS2010
          http://ns1.ohka.cs.is.nagoya-u.ac.jp/~iris_admin
                March 8-9, 2010, Nagoya, Japan
********************************************************************

Dear Prof./Assoc.Prof./Dr./Sir/Madam/Mr/Miss,

I would like to take the opportunity to extend an invitation to you and your colleagues to participate in the 2010 International Symposium on Robotics 
and Intelligent Sensors (IRIS2010) which will be held in Nagoya University, Nagoya, Japan, March 8-9, 2010. 

We have extended the dateline for abstract paper submission to 15 October 2009 after received many requests from robotics and sensors communities.
Please take this opportunity to submit your papers and participate in this symposium.

IRIS2010 will be held on March 8-9, 2010, after the 2010 ACM/IEEE International Conference on Human-Robot Interaction (HRI2010) in Osaka Japan on 
March 2-5, 2010. For those who are attending HRI2010, you are most welcome to joint IRIS2010.

IRIS2010 covers wide areas of research topics in robotics and sensors including various aspects of developmental robots, robot applications, 
development of intelligent sensors, sensor networks, sensor application in robotics, human sensing, human psychophysics and human-robot interaction.
For details of the symposium topics, please visit the conference website http://ns1.ohka.cs.is.nagoya-u.ac.jp/~iris_admin

IRIS2010 proceedings will be publish in a special issue of the Journal of Computer Science by Science Publications.
The Journal of Computer Science is indexed by SCOPUS, IET, Thomson Gale, etc. and available in both online and print formats.
The authors of selected best papers in IRIS2010 will be invited to submit an extended version of their papers for publication in the International 
Journal of Social Robotics and International Journal on Smart Sensing and Intelligent Systems.

We are also welcome proposals for special sessions and workshops.
Sponsorship, exhibit and demonstration opportunities are also available. 
Please contact the conference secretary at hanafiah at nuem.nagoya-u.ac.jp for further details.

*Important Dates* 
October 15, 2009: Submission of abstract (Two pages of paper abstract including text, figures, tables and references) 
October 31, 2009: Notification of acceptance 
January 15, 2010: Submission of camera-ready papers (Four pages of final camera-ready papers) 
January 31, 2010: Early registration
March 8-9, 2010: Symposium

*Awards* 
IRIS2010 will feature the following awards: 
1) Best Robotic Paper Award 
2) Best Intelligent Sensor Paper Award

*Contact* 
Email: iris_admin at nuem.nagoya-u.ac.jp, hanafiah at nuem.nagoya-u.ac.jp (Secretariat) 
Website: http://ns1.ohka.cs.is.nagoya-u.ac.jp/~iris_admin 

Dr. Hanafiah Yussof
Secretariat IRIS2010 
Nagoya University Japan

Prof. Masahiro Ohka,
Ganeral Chair IRIS2010
Nagoya University Japan

We looking forward for your participant.
Thank you.









=============================================================
Dr. Hanafiah Yussof
JSPS Posdoctoral Fellow
Nagoya University
Graduate School of Information Science
Department of Complex Systems Science
Furo-cho Chikusa-ku
Nagoya 464-8601, Japan
E-mail: hanafiah at nuem.nagoya-u.ac.jp
        hanafi3013 at hotmail.com
Tel: +81-52-789-4251, Fax: +81-52-789-4800 or 3129
http://ns1.ohka.cs.is.nagoya-u.ac.jp/ohka_lab2/index_eng.html
=============================================================

*************************[ CALL FOR PAPERS ]*****************************
2010 International Symposium on Robotics and Intelligent Sensors IRIS2010
           8-9 March 2010, Nagoya University, Nagoya, Japan
           http://ns1.ohka.cs.is.nagoya-u.ac.jp/~iris_admin
*************************************************************************


From p.salvini at sssup.it  Fri Oct  2 04:54:27 2009
From: p.salvini at sssup.it (Pericle Salvini)
Date: Fri, 2 Oct 2009 13:54:27 +0200
Subject: [robotics-worldwide] DEADLINE EXTENDED Oct. 31st,
	2009 - Advanced Robotics Special Issue Legal and Safety Constraints
	for Service Robots Deployment
Message-ID: <8421691BABC342F19DA760F12F5AB6AA@dustbotpc>

[* apologies for multiple postings*]

RSJ ADVANCED ROBOTICS: Special Issue on Legal and Safety Constraints for
Service Robots Deployment 

         ***DEADLINE EXTENTED***
	
	New deadline: - October 31st, 2009 -

--- 2nd CALL FOR PAPERS---

The purpose of this special issue is to address, in an interdisciplinary
way, the legal and safety problems brought about by the actual deployment of
autonomous mobile robots in public environments, pointing out constraints as
well as possible solutions. 
Papers on all aspects relevant to robot legal and safety issues are invited,
including - but not limited to - the following topics:

- Strategies for safety and dependability in human-robot interaction and
navigation
- Novel methodologies for risk evaluation
- Legal issues for robot deployment in urban settings (e.g. traffic law,
privacy, autonomy and liability, etc.)
- Robot insurance
- Safety standards and certification
- Case studies analysis

Editors:

	Dr. Pericle Salvini (Scuola Superiore Sant'Anna, Pisa, Italy)
	Prof. Cecilia Laschi (Scuola Superiore Sant'Anna, Pisa, Italy)

Publish in Vol. 24, No. 10 (August 2010)

http://www.rsj.or.jp/AR/index_e.html

__________________
Pericle Salvini
ARTS Lab 
Scuola Superiore Sant'Anna
Polo Sant'Anna Valdera,
Viale Rinaldo Piaggio, 34
56025 Pontedera (PI)
Italy
Tel. +39 050 883422
Fax. +39 050 883497
E-mail: p.salvini at sssup.it




From enric.cervera at icc.uji.es  Fri Oct  2 06:46:30 2009
From: enric.cervera at icc.uji.es (Enric Cervera)
Date: Fri, 2 Oct 2009 15:46:30 +0200
Subject: [robotics-worldwide] Call for Papers: IARP Workshop RISE 2010
Message-ID: <D4AA91A4-C1A9-4A60-BA3D-AAF06F7B73AD@icc.uji.es>

Apologies for multiple postings.

IARP Workshop on
?Robots for Risky Interventions
and Environmental  Surveillance-Maintenance?

January, 20-21, Sheffield, UK

The general objective of the International Advanced Robotics
Programme (IARP)  is to encourage development of advanced
robotic systems that can dispense with human work for
difficult activities in harsh, demanding or dangerous
environments, and to contribute to the revitalization and
growth of the world economy.

Through this fourth  workshop, the IARP working group RISE
(Risky Intervention and Surveillance /Maintenance of the
Environment) and the the European partners of the
FW6/FW7-IST projects(a.o.  View-Finder (aiming the
assistance of fire-fighting/protection services) and Guardians
(aiming the use of swarm of robots for Rescue assistance)
organise dedicated sessions on next topics:

- Inspection of fire or crisis grounds
- CBRN-E  threats
- Map building and reconstruction
- Networked crisis management tools
- Human-Machine Interfaces
- Remote controlled, semi-autonomous, autonomous robot navigation
- Multi-robot cooperation
- Swarm of robots
- Crisis Management tools

An abstract (approximately 300 words in English)
should be received not later than October 15,
2009. Electronic submissions of the abstracts
(Word , PS-format, PDF-files) should be mailed to:

rise2010 at shu.ac.uk

- Paper proposal deadline:    October 15, 2008
- Final selection and invitation of participants:    November 1, 2008
- Receipt of full-papers:         November 13, 2008

Workshop inquiries to:

Workshop ?Risky Interventions and
Environmental Surveillance RISE 2010

Jacques Penders
MERI, Sheffield Hallam University, Howard
Street, Sheffield, UK
rise2010 at shu.ac.uk


From landau at gostai.com  Sun Oct  4 06:29:34 2009
From: landau at gostai.com (Samuel Landau)
Date: Sun, 04 Oct 2009 15:29:34 +0200
Subject: [robotics-worldwide] Humanoids'09 Tutorial : Reusable behavior
 programming using the Urbi Robotics software platform
Message-ID: <4AC8A33E.5040200@gostai.com>

(Our apologies if you receive multiple copies of this announcement)

                       CALL FOR PARTICIPATION

                 TUTORIAL AT HUMANOIDS 2009 CONFERENCE

		  Reusable Behavior Programming
	    using the Urbi Robotics Software Platform

		http://www.gostai.com/humanoids09.html

		Registration before November 25,2009
	http://www.humanoids2009.org/travel/registration

	Session date confirmation on December 01, 2009

Abstract

Urbi is a robotics middleware originally developed at the Cognitive
Robotics Lab in ENSTA to facilitate the programming of the Sony Aibo
robot. Urbi is based on a distributed C++ component architecture called
UObject, coupled to urbiScript, a new parallel and event?based script
language that acts as an orchestrator to define behaviors through the
interaction of the components. Some components are typically drivers for
the hardware, while others handle image processing or various
algorithms. Urbi includes also a graphical programming suite called
urbiStudio, which facilitates the design of HFSM (Hierarchical Finite
State Machines), generic graphical interfaces and remote controllers.
This tutorial will cover the core aspects of Urbi and give a good
introduction to interested researchers who can then freely download the
SDK and use it with commercial or customized robots.

Prerequisites

No previous knowledge of Urbi is necessary to attend the tutorial. A
good understanding of C++ is required to follow the explanations on
UObject, and the tutorial can be followed on Windows, Linux or Mac.

More information: http://www.gostai.com/humanoids09.html

limited number of participants
for more information : contact at gostai.com


From aude.billard at epfl.ch  Sun Oct  4 08:31:10 2009
From: aude.billard at epfl.ch (Billard Aude)
Date: Sun, 4 Oct 2009 17:31:10 +0200
Subject: [robotics-worldwide] EPIROB'09 - CALL FOR PARTICIPATION
Message-ID: <33DA0D789951914A95F9E8D3BA6583E767A4FF7D88@rex5.intranet.epfl.ch>

CALL FOR PARTICIPATION - EPIROB'09
 
9th International Conference on Epigenetic Robotics ? Modeling Cognitive Development in Robotic Systems
Venice, Italy, 12th-14th november, Centro Culturale Don Orione Artigianelli 
 
http://www.epigenetic-robotics.org/
 
Registration is now open!
 
=== Keynote speakers:
Kim Bard, University of Portsmouth, UK
Cynthia Breazeal, MIT Media Lab, US
Heidi Keller, University of Osnabr?ck, Germany
David Leavens, Sussex University, UK
 
=== Topics
Epigenetic robotics includes the two-fold goal of understanding biological systems by the interdisciplinary integration between social/life and engineering sciences and, simultaneously, that of enabling robots and other artificial systems to autonomously develop skills for any particular environment (instead of programming them to solve particular goals for a specific environment). Interdisciplinary theory and empirical evidence are used to inform epigenetic robotic models, and these models can be used as theoretical tools to make experimental predictions in developmental psychology and other disciplines studying cognitive development in living systems.
 
SPECIAL TOPIC of EPIROB'09:
This year's edition of Epigenetic Robotics will have a special focus on emotional and social development, particularly addressed by keynote speakers and special discussion and working groups. However, submissions are welcome regarding all aspects of the study of cognitive development.
 
=== 14th november afternoon: Joint event with the International Workshop on Intrinsically Motivated Robots, organized by the EU project IM-CLeVeR on November 14-17, 2009, Venice, at the same same than Epirob.
http://im-clever.noze.it/announcements/events/im-clever-international-workshop
 
Topic: Intrinsic Motivation and Socio-Emotional Development
 
==Keynote speakers:
Jacqueline Nadel, CNRS, Universit? Pierre-et-Maris Curie/La Salp?tri?re, France
Pierre-Yves Oudeyer, INRIA, France
 
The workshop will start in the afternoon of November 14 with a joint session co-organized by EpiRob'09, FEELIX GROWING and IM-CLeVeR. This workshop will be free of charge for EpiRob'09 delegates, within the limits of space available.
 

=== Organizing committee
 
General and program chair: Lola Canamero, Univ. Hertfordshire, UK
Program co-chair: Pierre-Yves Oudeyer, INRIA, France
 
Publicity co-chairs:
Hideki Kozima, Miyagi Univ., Japan
Nadia Bianchi-Berthouze, Univ. College London, UK
Aude Billard, EPFL, Switzerland
 
Publication chair:
Christian Balkenius, Lund University, Sweden
 

We are looking forward to seeing you in Venice!
 
 
 
 

From cmatei at cs.columbia.edu  Mon Oct  5 09:21:03 2009
From: cmatei at cs.columbia.edu (Matei Ciocarlie)
Date: Mon, 05 Oct 2009 09:21:03 -0700
Subject: [robotics-worldwide] Call for Participation: ICRA 2010 Mobile
	Manipulation Challenge
Message-ID: <4ACA1CEF.4000601@cs.columbia.edu>

ICRA 2010 Mobile Manipulation Challenge
May 3-8, 2010
Anchorage, AK, USA
http://www.willowgarage.com/mmc10

CALL FOR PARTICIPATION

Entries are sought for the 2010 Mobile Manipulation Challenge, to be 
held in conjunction with the IEEE ICRA 2010, Anchorage, AK. 
Participation at the Challenge will consist of a hardware demonstration 
of a robot solving one of the pre-defined Challenge tasks. This 
demonstration must be performed on-site, in the environment set up for 
the Challenge.

The main components of the Challenge are:

* CHALLENGE EVENTS: the high-level applications that will be 
demonstrated at the Challenge. This year's events include cleaning up a 
room, loading a dishwasher, and playing board games. It is important to 
note that all events are described at a relatively high level, and 
strict adherence to the description is not mandatory. Teams have the 
option of relaxing certain components of a task, e.g.  by placing 
fiducial markers in the environment, restricting the manipulated objects 
to a pre-defined set, etc.

* LETTER OF PARTICIPATION: participants should submit a written 
description of the intended entry for the Challenge before the deadline 
below. The letter of participation must include a description of the 
hardware platform, a high-level description of the algorithms to be 
used, a list of all assumptions / relaxations that will be employed, and 
pointers to the team's relevant recent work in this field.

* CHALLENGE FORMAT: we see this event as a challenge, and not as a 
competition. There will be no formal ``winners'', and, for that matter, 
no official ranking of the participating teams. We expect the teams to 
showcase their results at the Challenge, and show reliable performance 
in a live demo setting. Every participant that can show a level of 
performance at or above the description stated in the letter of 
participation is, for our purposes, a challenge winner.

* CHALLENGE REPORT: all the teams that successfully participate in the 
challenge will be invited to contribute an article to a published report 
centralizing all the results achieved. This report will also contain the 
key approaches and algorithms used at the challenge. Our aim is for a 
complete challenge report as a snapshot of the state of the art in 
mobile manipulation as it relates to our challenge events, complete with 
key research insights, implementation details and results.

The important dates for the Challenge are:
* December 1, 2009: submission of letter of participation
* December 15, 2009: notification of participation decision
* May 3-8, 2010: Challenge Events

Travel support may be possible for selected participants and their 
hardware, depending on available funds and level of demand.

For more details, please visit http://www.willowgarage.com/mmc10 or 
contact Matei Ciocarlie<matei at willowgarage.com> or Bill Smart 
<wds at cse.wustl.edu>.


From rjwood at eecs.harvard.edu  Sun Oct  4 19:21:36 2009
From: rjwood at eecs.harvard.edu (Rob Wood)
Date: Sun, 4 Oct 2009 22:21:36 -0400
Subject: [robotics-worldwide] postdoc positions open
Message-ID: <E4891D3D-9A2C-44A8-B727-46B49789266D@eecs.harvard.edu>

Postdoctoral researcher positions open at Harvard on the 'RoboBees'  
project.  For more information, please see:

http://robobees.seas.harvard.edu/opportunities



From yangl at HLT.UTDALLAS.EDU  Mon Oct  5 10:36:06 2009
From: yangl at HLT.UTDALLAS.EDU (Yang Liu)
Date: Mon, 5 Oct 2009 12:36:06 -0500
Subject: [robotics-worldwide] ICMI-MLMI 2009 hotel reservation extended to
	Oct 9, 2009
Message-ID: <Pine.LNX.4.63.0910051202001.9848@hlt.utdallas.edu>


  ===== important information related to hotel reservation =====

Hotel reservation has been extended to Oct 9, 2009.
Their reservation system has been incorrectly rejecting people. 
Please call 1-800-228-9290 if you get rejected trying to book rooms or 
cannot get the conference rate of $189.00 for the duration of the 
conference. 
If you have problems, you can also email oc-icmi2009 at acm.org.



--------------------------------------------------------------------
 	ICMI-MLMI 2009,  November 2-6
 	Cambridge, MA, USA

The conference will take place at the MIT Media Lab, widely known for its
innovative spirit. Organized in Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA, ICMI-MLMI 09 
provides an excellent setting for brainstorming and sharing the latest
advances in multimodal interaction, systems and methods in an inspired setting 
of a city, known as one of the top historical, technological and scientific 
centers of the US.


Technical program is online,
see http://icmi2009.acm.org/Program.html for more information.

Invited speakers:

Cynthia Breazeal, MIT "Living Better with Robots";

Stephen Brewster, University of Glasgow;

Fr?d?ric Kaplan, EPFL, "Are Gesture-based Interfaces The Future of Human 
Computer Interaction?"


Program committee:

General Co-chairs:
     James Crowley, INRIA
     Yuri Ivanov, MERL
     Christopher Wren, Google
Program Co-Chairs
     Daniel Gatica-Perez, Idiap Research Institute
     Michael Johnston, AT&T Research
     Rainer Stiefelhagen University of Karlsruhe
Treasurer
     Janet McAndless,MERL
Sponsorship
     Herv? Bourlard, Idiap Research Institute
Student Chair
     Rana el Kaliouby, MIT Media Lab
Student Volunteer Chair
     Matthew Berlin, MIT Media Lab
Local Arrangements
     Clifton Forlines, MERL
     Deb Roy, MIT Media Lab
     Thanks to Cole Krumbholz, MITRE
Publicity
     Sonya Allin , University of Toronto
     Yang Liu, University of Texas at Dallas
Publications
     Louis-Philippe Morency , University of South California
Workshops
     Xilin Chen, JDL
     Steve Renals, University of Edinburgh
Demos
     Denis Lalanne, University of Fribourg
     Enrique Vidal, Polytechnic University of Valencia
Posters
     Kenji Mase, University of Nagoya

ICMI Advisory Board
     Matthew Turk, Chair, UC Santa Barbara (USA)
     Jim Crowley, INRIA-Rhone Alpes (France)
     Trevor Darrell, UCB/ICSI (USA)
     Kenji Mase, University of Nagoya (Japan)
     Eric Horvitz, Microsoft Research (USA)
     Sharon Oviatt, Adapx (USA)
     Fabio Pianesi, ITC-irst (Italy)
     Wolfgang Wahlster, DFKI (Germany)
     Jie Yang, Carnegie Mellon University (USA)

MLMI Advisory Board
    Herv? Bourlard, Idiap Research Institute (Switzerland)
    Steve Renals, University of Edinburgh (UK)
    Sharon Oviatt, Adapx (USA)
    Rainer Stiefelhagen, Universitaet Karlsruhe (Germany)
    Jean Carletta, University of Edinburgh (UK)
    Catherine Pelachaud, CNRS (France)
    Sadaoki Furui, Tokyo Institute of Technology (Japan)
    Samy Bengio, Google (USA)
    Andrei Popescu-Belis, Idiap Research Institute (Switzerland)

From chaillet at ens2m.fr  Mon Oct  5 12:23:07 2009
From: chaillet at ens2m.fr (Nicolas Chaillet)
Date: Mon, 05 Oct 2009 21:23:07 +0200
Subject: [robotics-worldwide] Workshop dMEMS (distributed MEMS) - June 2010
In-Reply-To: <4A699ECA.3040404@ens2m.fr>
References: <4A687B8B.3020602@ens2m.fr> <4A699ECA.3040404@ens2m.fr>
Message-ID: <4ACA479B.2010703@ens2m.fr>

Please find the CFP of the *Workshop on design, control and software 
implementation for distributed MEMS* at the following URL : 
http://dmems.univ-fcomte.fr/callforpapers.html

The workshop will be held in Besan?on, France, in June 2010.

Deadline for paper submission: January 15th, 2010

Sincerely,

N. Chaillet

-- 
____________________________________________________________________________

Nicolas Chaillet

Professeur ? l'Universit? de Franche-Comt?
http://www.univ-fcomte.fr


Directeur du Dpt Automatique et Syst?mes Micro-M?catroniques (AS2M)
Institut FEMTO-ST UMR CNRS 6174 - UFC / ENSMM / UTBM

Head of the Automatic Control and Micro-Mechatronic Systems Department
FEMTO-ST Institute

FEMTO-ST / AS2M
24, Rue Alain Savary
F - 25000 Besan?on

Tel/Phone : +33 (0)3 81 40 28 11
Tel secr?tariat/Secretariat phone : +33 (0)3 81 40 28 01
Fax : +33 (0)3 81 40 28 09
E-mail : nicolas.chaillet at femto-st.fr

http://www.femto-st.fr/
____________________________________________________________________________


-- 
____________________________________________________________________________

Nicolas Chaillet

Professeur ? l'Universit? de Franche-Comt?
http://www.univ-fcomte.fr


Directeur du Dpt Automatique et Syst?mes Micro-M?catroniques (AS2M)
Institut FEMTO-ST UMR CNRS 6174 - UFC / ENSMM / UTBM

Head of the Automatic Control and Micro-Mechatronic Systems Department
FEMTO-ST Institute

FEMTO-ST / AS2M
24, Rue Alain Savary
F - 25000 Besan?on

Tel/Phone : +33 (0)3 81 40 28 11
Tel secr?tariat/Secretariat phone : +33 (0)3 81 40 28 01
Fax : +33 (0)3 81 40 28 09
E-mail : nicolas.chaillet at femto-st.fr

http://www.femto-st.fr/
____________________________________________________________________________


From ants at iridia.ulb.ac.be  Tue Oct  6 03:32:26 2009
From: ants at iridia.ulb.ac.be (Ants 2010)
Date: Tue, 6 Oct 2009 12:32:26 +0200
Subject: [robotics-worldwide] ANTS 2010 - International Conference on Swarm
	Intelligence
Message-ID: <20091006103226.GA29702@manubrambi-desktop>

*** Apologies if you have received this CFP more than once  ***

                             ANTS 2010
       Seventh International Conference on Swarm Intelligence

              September 8-10, 2010. Brussels, Belgium


           Call for papers prepared on September 2, 2009
             More details and up-to-date information at
                  http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/ants2010


Scope of the Conference
=======================

 Swarm intelligence is a relatively new discipline that deals with  the study of self-organizing processes both in nature and in  artificial systems. Researchers in ethology and animal behavior have  proposed many models to explain interesting aspects of social insect  behavior such as self-organization and shape-formation. Recently,  algorithms and methods inspired by these models have been proposed  to solve difficult problems in many domains.

 An example of a particularly successful research direction in swarm  intelligence is ant colony optimization, the main focus of which is on discrete optimization problems. Ant colony optimization has been applied successfully to a large number of difficult discrete optimization problems including the traveling salesman problem, the quadratic assignment problem, scheduling, vehicle routing, etc., as well as to routing in telecommunication networks. Another interesting approach is that of particle swarm optimization, that focuses on continuous optimization problems. Here too, a number of successful applications can be found in the recent literature. Swarm robotics is another relevant field. Here, the focus is on applying swarm intelligence techniques to the control of large groups of cooperating autonomous robots.

 ANTS 2010 will give researchers in swarm intelligence the opportunity to meet, to present their latest research, and to discuss current developments and applications.

 The three-day conference will be held in Brussels, Belgium, on September 8-10, 2010. Tutorial sessions will be held in the mornings before the conference program. 


Relevant Research Areas
=======================

 ANTS 2010 solicits contributions dealing with any aspect of swarm intelligence. Typical, but not exclusive, topics of interest are:

   + Behavioral models of social insects or other animal societies that can stimulate new algorithmic approaches.

   + Empirical and theoretical research in swarm intelligence.

   + Application of swarm intelligence methods, such as ant colony optimization or particle swarm optimization, to real-world problems.

   + Theoretical and experimental research in swarm robotics systems.


Publication Details
===================

 As for previous editions of the ANTS conference, proceedings will be published by Springer in the LNCS series (to be confirmed). The journal Swarm Intelligence will publish a special issue dedicated to ANTS 2010 that will contain extended versions of the best research works presented at the conference.


Best Paper Award
================

 A best paper award will be presented at the conference.


Further Information
===================

 Up-to-date information will be published on the web site http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/ants2010/. For information about local
 arrangements, registration forms, etc., please refer to the above-mentioned web site or contact the local organizers at the address below.


Conference Address
==================

 ANTS 2010
 IRIDIA, CP 194/6                 Tel +32-2-6502729
 Universite' Libre de Bruxelles   Fax +32-2-6502715
 Av. F. D. Roosevelt 50           http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/ants2010
 1050 Bruxelles, Belgium          email: ants at iridia.ulb.ac.be


Conference Location
===================

 Salle Dupreel, Building S, Campus du Solbosch, Universite' Libre de Bruxelles, Av. Jeanne 44, 1050 Brussels, Belgium.


Important Dates
===============

 Submission deadline             February 28, 2010
 Notification of acceptance         April 30, 2010
 Camera ready copy                    May 14, 2010
 Conference                   September 8-10, 2010


ANTS 2010 Conference Committee
==============================

 General Chair
   Marco Dorigo

 Technical Program Chairs
   Andries Engelbrecht, Gianni Di Caro, Luca M. Gambardella,
   and Erol Sahin

 Publication Chair
   Roderich Gross

 Organization Chairs
   Mauro Birattari and Thomas Stuetzle

 Special Sessions Chairs
   Rene' Doursat, Dario Floreano, Hiroki Sayama, and Jon Timmis

 Publicity Chair
   Xiadong Li

 Local Arrangements
   Manuele Brambilla

From lafrenz at in.tum.de  Tue Oct  6 07:15:45 2009
From: lafrenz at in.tum.de (Reinhard Lafrenz)
Date: Tue, 06 Oct 2009 16:15:45 +0200
Subject: [robotics-worldwide] ECHORD - Call for Experiment Proposals
Message-ID: <4ACB5111.5020500@in.tum.de>

Dear colleagues,

The first call for ECHORD experiment proposals is now open.
The deadline is 1st Dec. 2009, 17:00 Brussels time.
More information can be found on our web site
http://www.echord.info/wikis/home-wiki/1st-call-for-experiment-proposals


In the context of ECHORD, small-scale technical projects, so-called ?experiments?,
will be conducted, which will use state-of-the art robotic equipment.

To outline the scope of the research work three scenarios have been defined
that represent the expected use of state-of-the-art robot technologies in
the near future: the human robot co-worker scenario, the hyper-flexible cells
scenario and the cognitive factory scenario.

This call for experiment proposals targets the first scenario, human-robot co-worker.
However, proposals focused on the other two scenarios may be submitted.


Kind regards,
Reinhard Lafrenz

-- 
Dr. Reinhard Lafrenz				
Department of Informatics VI
Robotics and Embedded Systems                   Tel:  +49.(0)89.289.18136
Technische Universit?t M?nchen                  Fax:   +49.(0)89.289.18107
Boltzmannstr. 3, 85748 Garching b. M?nchen      Email: lafrenz at in.tum.de
Germany                                         http://www6.cs.tum.edu/Main/Lafrenz

From mpd37 at cam.ac.uk  Tue Oct  6 08:59:42 2009
From: mpd37 at cam.ac.uk (Marc Deisenroth)
Date: Tue, 06 Oct 2009 16:59:42 +0100
Subject: [robotics-worldwide] Probabilistic Approaches for Robotics and
 Control (NIPS workshop) - 2nd call for contributions
Message-ID: <4ACB696E.2090301@cam.ac.uk>

################################################################
                  CALL FOR CONTRIBUTIONS

                      NIPS workshop on
       *Probabilistic Approaches for Robotics and Control*
                  (supported by PASCAL 2)
################################################################

*Workshop dates*
Friday, December 11, 2009

*Workshop location*
Whistler, B.C., Canada, at the Westin Resort and Spa and the
Hilton Whistler Resort and Spa


*Poster submission*

Please send an extended abstract of max. 1 page describing the
poster you intend to present to
mpd37 at cam.ac.uk
Choose a format of your liking, e.g., the standard NIPS
template.

The *deadline for abstract submissions* is
October 17, 2009.

The *notification* will be
October 26, 2009.

*Workshop homepage*
http://mlg.eng.cam.ac.uk/marc/nipsWS09


*Conference homepage*
http://nips.cc


*Workshop Abstract*

During the last decade, many areas of Bayesian machine learning have
reached a high level of maturity. This has resulted in a variety of
theoretically sound and efficient algorithms for learning and
inference in the presence of uncertainty. However, in the context of
control, robotics, and reinforcement learning, uncertainty has not yet
been treated with comparable rigor despite its central role in
risk-sensitive control, sensorimotor control, robust control, and
cautious control. A consistent treatment of uncertainty is also
essential when dealing with stochastic policies, incomplete state
information, and exploration strategies.

A typical situation where uncertainty comes into play is when the
exact state transition dynamics are unknown and only limited or no
expert knowledge is available and/or affordable. One option is to
learn a model from data. However, if the model is too far off, this
approach can result in arbitrarily bad solutions. This model bias can
be sidestepped by the use of flexible model-free methods. The
disadvantage of model-free methods is that they do not generalize and
often make less efficient use of data. Therefore, they often need more
trials than feasible to solve a problem on a real-world system. A
probabilistic model could be used for efficient use of data while
alleviating model bias by explicitly representing and incorporating
uncertainty.

The use of probabilistic approaches requires (approximate) inference
algorithms, where Bayesian machine learning can come into
play. Although probabilistic modeling and inference conceptually fit
into this context, they are not widespread in robotics, control, and
reinforcement learning. Hence, this workshop aims to bring researchers
together to discuss the need, the theoretical properties, and the
practical implications of probabilistic methods in control, robotics,
and reinforcement learning.

One particular focus will be on probabilistic reinforcement learning
approaches that profit recent developments in optimal control which
show that the problem can be substantially simplified if certain
structure is imposed. The simplifications include linearity of the
(Hamilton-Jacobi) Bellman equation. The duality with Bayesian
estimation allow for analytical computation of the optimal control
laws and closed form expressions of the optimal value functions.
Format

The workshop will consist of short invited presentations and a session
with contributed posters (plus poster spotlight). Topics (from a
theoretical and practical perspective) to be addressed include, but
are not limited to:

- How can we efficiently plan and act in the presence of uncertainty
   in states/rewards/observations/environment?

- Shall we model the lack of knowledge or can we simply ignore it?

- How can prior knowledge (e.g., expert knowledge and domain
   knowledge) be incorporated?

- How much manual tuning and human insight (e.g., domain
   knowledge) is a) required and b) available to achieve good
   performance?

- Is there a principled way to account for imprecise models and
   model bias?

- What roles should probabilistic models play in control? Are they
   needed at all?

- What kinds of probabilistic models are useful?

- In traditional control, hand-crafted control laws often prevail
   since optimal control laws are mostly too aggressive due to
   model errors while robust control laws can be too conservative
   since they always assume the worst case. Can "probabilistic
   control" bridge the gap between robust and optimal control laws?

- How can we exploit the linearity of the (Hamilton-Jacobi) Bellman
   equation and the duality with Bayesian estimation?

- Can we compute the optimal control law analytically and is there a
   closed-form expression of the value function?

- How can existing machine learning methods be applied to efficiently
   solve stochastic control problems?


*Invited speakers*

Dieter Fox (University of Washington), confirmed
Drew Bagnell (CMU), pending
Evangelos Theodorou (USC), confirmed
Jovan Popovic (MIT), confirmed
Konrad Koerding (Northwestern University), confirmed
Marc Toussaint (TU Berlin), confirmed
Miroslav Karny (Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic), confirmed
Roderick Murray-Smith (University of Glasgow), confirmed
Bert Kappen (University of Nijmegen), confirmed
Emanuel Todorov (University of Washington), confirmed


*Support*
The workshop is supported by PASCAL2 and the Technical Committee on 
Robot Learning


*Organizers*

Marc Peter Deisenroth
Bert Kappen
Emanuel Todorov
Duy Nguyen-Tuong
Carl Edward Rasmussen
Jan Peters

From Kanna.Rajan at mbari.org  Tue Oct  6 16:00:17 2009
From: Kanna.Rajan at mbari.org (Kanna Rajan)
Date: Tue, 6 Oct 2009 16:00:17 -0700
Subject: [robotics-worldwide] Postdoc position Autonomous Systems MBARI,
	California
Message-ID: <7B1066A1-48EE-49CF-B04A-D48B41DC8EB6@mbari.org>

The Autonomous System group at the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research  
Institute (MBARI) invites applications for 1 two-year postdoc position.

MBARI (http://www.mbari.org)  is a private non-profit Oceanographic  
research institute located in Moss Landing, California, in the heart  
of the  largest marine sanctuary in the United States, just outside  
Silicon Valley. The institute is an inter-disciplinary research  
institution guided by a strong peer relationship between scientists,  
engineers and marine operations staff. MBARI pioneered the use of  
Remotely Operated Vehicles (ROVs http://www.mbari.org/dmo/vessels_vehicles/tiburon/tiburon.html) 
  and Autonomous Underwater Vehicles (AUVshttp://www.mbari.org/auv/default.htm) 
  for deep ocean research and continues to be at the cutting edge of  
marine robotics, marine sensor development, ocean chemistry, marine  
geology, micro-biology and ecology.

Research Focus:

The Autonomous Systems group is uniquely placed as being the only  
Artificial Intelligence group within an operational oceanographic  
setting anywhere. The focus of the groups effort is in automated  
reasoning for embodied robust intelligence for AUVs with a focus on  
Automated Planning, Execution, Constraint-Based Reasoning and Machine  
Learning. The core development effort is to enable adaptive control  
for AUVs to survey, sample and characterize dynamic and episodic ocean  
phenomenon such as Harmful Algal Blooms, Fronts and Thin Layers which  
have substantial societal impact (http://www.mbari.org/autonomy/ 
TREX/). Further efforts are underway to study the feasibility of goal- 
based commanding for underwater feature-based SLAM, mixed-initiative  
platform control and multi-vehicle coordination.

Research Environment:

The Autonomous Systems group was established in 2005 by researchers  
from NASA with extensive background in commanding spacecraft including  
the twin Mars Rovers Spirit and Opportunity. A strong inter- 
disciplinary effort with biological oceanographers at MBARI and others  
outside has driven the design and deployment of a hybrid executive  
which enables an AUV to adaptively sample the environment using  
Planning and Machine Learning techniques to inform dynamic in-situ  
behavior. Publishing in peer-reviewed conferences and journals in AI,  
Robotics and the Ocean Sciences and interacting with scientists in the  
fields of biology, chemistry, ecology, genetics, ocean physics, marine  
robotics is an important aspect of the research effort. The group  
collaborates with AI and Robotics researchers in academia in the US  
and Europe and hosts visiting graduate students and researchers from  
within the US and Europe.

Primary topic areas of interest for this position are:

1. Automated Planning and Execution
2. Constraint-based Reasoning
3. Mixed-Initiative Planning with marine robots
4. Distributed Planning

Applicants are encouraged to communicate with the PI for project  
feasibility and relevance to ongoing MBARI research. Women and  
minorities are strongly encouraged to apply. Details of the  
application process are at
http://www.mbari.org/oed/jobs/Postdocs-2010.html. The deadline for  
applications is December 11th 2009.


From asada at MIT.EDU  Wed Oct  7 19:27:15 2009
From: asada at MIT.EDU (Harry H. Asada)
Date: Wed, 07 Oct 2009 22:27:15 -0400
Subject: [robotics-worldwide] IJRR Special Issue Call-for-Papers
Message-ID: <4ACD4E03.3070207@mit.edu>

___________________________________________________________________________
International Journal of Robotics Research

Special Issue on
*** Stochasticity in Robotics and Biological Systems ***
Guest Editors: H. Harry Asada (M.I.T.) and Vijay Kumar (University of 
Pennsylvania)
____________________________________________________________________________

Invitation:
The International Journal of Robotics Research (IJRR) invites papers for 
a special issue on Stochasticity in Robotics and Biological Systems. 
Stochasticity has been a central issue in many branches of robotics 
research. Not only basic signal processing, communication, filtering, 
and control, but also advanced localization, planning, learning, and 
optimization as well as self-assembly and emergent behaviors are all 
heavily involved in stochasticity. Understanding of the stochastic 
nature of robotic systems and its strategic use are an integral part in 
developing effective systems. Biological systems are noisy systems, 
built upon thermodynamic random processes. Yet, a biological system is a 
highly regulated system that is robust and sustainable as well as 
flexible and adaptable. Although individual cells and molecules are 
stochastic, their collective behaviors are highly organized, exhibiting 
a particular morphological structure and high-level functionality. There 
will be effective architecture and regulatory mechanisms exploiting 
stochasticity that today?s engineered systems have not yet utilized. It 
is our expectation that this special issue will display emerging new 
theory and methodologies, novel robotic systems and devices, and 
frontier research efforts in broad areas of stochastic robotics with 
emphasis on cross-disciplinary research between robotics and biological 
systems.

Papers are solicited on all aspects of stochastic robotics, including, 
but not limited to, the following:

- Stochastic emergent behaviors of multi-robot systems and swarms;
- Bio-inspired population modeling and control;
- Machine learning, stochastic approximation, and probabilistic planning 
and optimization;
- Neural system modeling, signal processing, and inference;
- Stochastic modeling and control of biological robots, including 
bacteria-powered micro-robots;
- Stochastic modeling and estimation of human behaviors and intension;
- Self-assembly and chemical kinetics in micro/nano robotic systems; and
- SLAM and integrated model building, data acquisition, and decision 
processes.

Papers must contain high-quality original contributions and be prepared 
in accordance with IJRR. All papers will be reviewed following the 
regular reviewing procedure of IJRR.

Manuscript Submission
Upload manuscripts to: http://mcmanuscriptcentral.com/ijrr. Under 
?Manuscript Type?, select ?Stochastic Robotics?. Instructions for 
authors, with information about ?Multimedia Extensions?, are available 
on-line at: 
http://www.uk.sagepub.com/repository/binaries/pdf/Multimedia_Extension_submissions.pdf. 


Important Dates:

November 30, 2009 Paper submission
April 30, 2010 Completion of First Review
June 15, 2010 Submission of Revised Papers
August 16, 2010 Completion of Final Review
September 4, 2010 Submission of Final Manuscripts and Source Files
Late 2010/Early 2011 Publication


From guo at eng.kagawa-u.ac.jp  Wed Oct  7 23:35:01 2009
From: guo at eng.kagawa-u.ac.jp (Shuxiang Guo)
Date: Thu, 8 Oct 2009 15:35:01 +0900
Subject: [robotics-worldwide] CFP of IEEE ICIA 2010 (Harbin, China,
	June 20-23, 2010)
Message-ID: <007f01ca47e1$7674f2f0$635ed8d0$@kagawa-u.ac.jp>

Would you like to deliver the CFP.
Thank you very much.


Dear Colleague,

  Apologies if you receive multiple copies of this announcement.  

  The 2010 IEEE International Conference on Information and Automation (ICIA
2010) will take place in Harbin, Heilongjiang, China from June 20 to June
23, 2010.
Please visit the website http://www.icia2010.org/ for the detailed
information.
 A renowned ancient city in China, Harbin is situated in northeastern China.
As the capital of Heilongjiang province, the city boasts the largest
historical museum of the Jin Dynasty, remains of the Huining Mansion and the
tombs of Wanyanaguda. Harbin is situated closest to the important
international markets of Japan,
  Korea and Russia. Its prime location makes Harbin an important economic
hub of the Eurasian corridor. 
  The objective of ICIA 2010 is to provide a forum for researchers,
educators, engineers, and 
  government officials involved in the general areas of information science
and automation
  engineering to disseminate their latest research results and exchange
views on the future
  research directions of these fields. 

  The topics of interest include, but not limited to the following:

  - Information acquisition, sensors and sensor networks
  - Computer vision, pattern recognition, and image processing
  - Information theory and technologies for automation
  - Human-machine interactions/interfaces, visual reality
  - Robotics, medical robots, network robots, tele-robotic
  - Inertial sensor and navigation system technology
  - Integrated navigation theory and method, wireless navigation
  - Micro and nano robots and systems
  - Machine intelligence and artificial intelligence
  - Mechatronics, control theory, automation process and industrial
automation


  Contributed Paper: 
  All papers must be submitted in PDF format prepared strictly following the
IEEE PDF 
  Requirements for Creating PDF Documents for IEEE Xplore. The standard
number of 
  pages is 6 and the maximum page limit is 8 pages with extra payment for
the two extra pages. 
  See detailed instructions in the conference web site. All papers accepted
by IEEE ICIA 2010 
  will be indexed by EI and included in IEEE Xplore. 

  Organized Sessions: 
  Proposals with the title, the organizers, and a brief statement of purpose
of the session must
  be submitted to an OS Chair by February 1, 2010.

  Tutorials & Workshops:
  Proposals for tutorials and workshops that address related topics must be
submitted to one of
  the Tutorial/Workshop Chairs by April 1, 2010.

  Best Paper Competition: 
  IEEE ICIA 2010 Conference has the following four categories of conference
awards:
  1) Best Conference Paper Award
  2) Best Information Paper Award
  3) Best Automation Paper Award
  4) Best Student Paper Award

  The winner of the Best Paper Award will receive a certificate. 

  Important Dates:

       February 1, 2010	Submission of full papers and organized session
       April 1,    2010	Proposals for tutorials and workshops
       April 1,    2010	Notification of paper and session acceptance
       April 15,   2010	Submission of final papers in IEEE PDF format

  For detailed up-to-date information, please visit the IEEE ICIA 2010
Conference website at:
  http://www.icia2010.org 

  We are striving to make IEEE ICIA 2010 a high quality conference. Your
strong support is greatly appreciated. 


  Sincerely, yours

  Shuxiang Guo & Yanling Hao, General Chairs of IEEE ICIA 2010
  Xiufen Ye & Xiangshi Ren, Program Chairs of IEEE ICIA 2010

--------------------------------
Shuxiang GUO (PH.D, Professor,IEEE Senior Member)
Founding Chair of IEEE ICMA Conference
(IEEE International Conference on Mechatronics and Automation)

Intelligent Mechanical Systems Eng'g Dept.
Fac. of Engineering, Kagawa University
2217-20, Hayashi-cho, Takamatsu, 
761-0396, JAPAN
Tel:+81-87-864-2333, Fax:+81-87-864-2369(2333)
E-mail: guo at eng.kagawa-u.ac.jp
URL:http://www.eng.kagawa-u.ac.jp/~guo/
--------------------------------




From riccardo.schiavi at ing.unipi.it  Wed Oct  7 09:08:20 2009
From: riccardo.schiavi at ing.unipi.it (Riccardo Schiavi)
Date: Wed, 7 Oct 2009 18:08:20 +0200
Subject: [robotics-worldwide] Call for partecipation: 2nd Workshop for Young
	Researchers on Human-Friendly Robotics
In-Reply-To: <4ACB696E.2090301@cam.ac.uk>
References: <4ACB696E.2090301@cam.ac.uk>
Message-ID: <5B938415-DC77-418E-AE74-48DD3209A3B3@ing.unipi.it>

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
CALL for PARTECIPATION
2nd Workshop for Young Researcher on Human-Friendly Robotics
http://hfr2009.wordpress.com/
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------


Dear all,
We invite you to submit a paper/abstract to The 2nd edition of:
?One-day Workshop for Young Researcher on Human Friendly Robotics?
http://hfr2009.wordpress.com/
The workshop will be held on December 3th, 2009, at Fondazione  
Mediaterraneo in Sestri Levante, Italy.



Motivations and Objectives
The growing need to automate daily tasks combined with new robot  
technologies are driving the development of human-friendly robots,  
i.e., safe and dependable machines, operating in the close vicinity to  
humans or directly interacting with persons in a wide range of  
domains. The technology shift from classical industrial robots, which  
are safely kept away from humans in cages, to robots that will be used  
in close collaboration with humans requires major technological  
challenges that need to be overcome.

The objective of the workshop is to share knowledge between young  
researchers on HFR from design, control towards safety and ethical  
issues related to the introduction of robots into the wider society.


List of topics
1) Design and Control strategies
2) Applications
3) Safety and legal issues


Registration
Registration is free of charge!
Those wishing to attend (attenders, speakers, organizers) must  
register by filling in this form and sending it by e-mail to hfr2009 at ing.unipi.it 
.


Important dates
Authors should send the paper title, authors, abstract to hfr2009 at ing.unipi.it 
  via email as soon as possible.
All papers (max 2 pages) must be submitted to hfr2009 at ing.unipi.it
Full paper submission due: November 1th, 2009
Notification of acceptance: November 10th, 2009

Organizers:
Agostino De Santis, Universita? degli Studi di Napoli Federico II
Gianluca Palli, Universita? di Bologna
Irene Sardellitti, Istituto Italiano di Tecnologia.
Riccardo Schiavi, Universita? di Pisa.


From maarja.kruusmaa at biorobotics.ttu.ee  Thu Oct  8 05:08:27 2009
From: maarja.kruusmaa at biorobotics.ttu.ee (Maarja Kruusmaa)
Date: Thu, 8 Oct 2009 15:08:27 +0300
Subject: [robotics-worldwide] Postdoc positions in TUT Center for Biorobotics
Message-ID: <100CC32D841D4B0E838F983BED00B883@LifeBook>


Tallinn University of Technology, Center for Biorobotics
www.biorobotics.ttu.ee in Estonia has the following position opening:

POSTDOCTORAL RESEARCHER 
Research areas: medical image processing, computer algorithms, parallel
computing, signal processing, soft organ modelling
Research focus: the researcher would participate in European Union financed
FP7 Framework project SAFROS dedicated to surgical automation. The research
would include real-time algorithm development for soft organ modelling,
calibration and deformation registration. It comprises the analysis of the
pre-operative and intra-operative modeling methods of deformable organs from
CT, MR and US scans, development of on-line reconstruction algorithms. 

POSTDOCTORAL RESEARCHER
Research areas: mechanical design of fish swimming robots, mechanical
modeling of fish swimming kinematics and dynamics
Research focus: the researcher would participate in European Union financed
FP7 Framework project FILOSE (www.filose.eu) dedicated to fish locomotion
and sensing and fish robots. It involves modeling of fish locomotion in
response to the hydrodynamic events, optimization of the mechanical
properties of the fish robot, mechanical design of fish robot prototypes,
experimental validation of the prototypes in a flume pipe. The work is
carried out in close cooperation with other research groups in the project
focusing on lateral line sensing, fish biology and control. 

RESEARCH ENVIRONMENT
TUT Center for Biorobotics is a recently established rapidly growing
multidisciplinary research center involved in several international research
projects. It is well equipped for theoretical and experimental work in
mechanics, control, fluid dynamics, CFD and parallel computing. We value
free academic spirit, novel ideas on the borderline of science and
technology, teamwork and cooperation over various disciplines. Estonia is an
EU member state with a rapid growth, modern infrastructure and thin
bureaucracy.

More information about the positions and the application procedure:
maarja.kruusmaa at biorobotics.ttu.ee

_______________________
Maarja Kruusmaa
Prof. Biorobotics
Tallinn University of Technology
Center for Biorobotics
http://www.biorobotics.ttu.ee

and

Fits.me Biorobotics
R&D director
www.fits.me
skype: nasuke
phone: (+372)51 83074


From jsabater at iiia.csic.es  Thu Oct  8 05:54:05 2009
From: jsabater at iiia.csic.es (Jordi Sabater-Mir)
Date: Thu, 08 Oct 2009 14:54:05 +0200
Subject: [robotics-worldwide] [AAMAS-2010] - 2nd Call for workshops proposal
Message-ID: <4ACDE0ED.2020207@iiia.csic.es>

     (apologies for multiple postings)


-------------------------------------------------------------------------
AAMAS 2010 - Call for Workshop Proposals
-------------------------------------------------------------------------


***** AAMAS 2010 has a SPECIAL TRACK on ROBOTICS and
therefore workshops on this topic are very welcome *****


The AAMAS-2010 Organizing Committee invites proposals for the Workshop
Program to be held on May 10-11, 2010  immediately prior to the main 
technical
program of the AAMAS conference.

The main goal of the AAMAS-2010 workshops is to stimulate and facilitate 
discussion,
interaction, and comparison of approaches, methods, and ideas related to 
specific
topics, both theoretical and applied, in the general area of Autonomous 
Agents and
Multiagent Systems. The AAMAS-2010 workshops will provide an informal 
setting where
participants will have the opportunity to discuss specific technical 
topics in an atmosphere
that fosters the active exchange of ideas. AAMAS 2010 will be co-located 
with KR,
NMR, ICAPS, FOIS, (all in Toronto) and DL 2010 (in Waterloo, Ontario, 
Canada),
and welcomes proposals that cater to the broader community across these 
areas.

Members from all areas of the AAMAS community are invited to submit 
workshop
proposals for review. Workshops on new and emerging topics, 
applications, and on
broader topics catering to the broader community represented by the 
co-located
events are particularly encouraged. Workshops can vary in length, but 
most will
be one full day in duration. Workshop organizers and attendees must 
register
for their workshop and preferably also for the  main AAMAS conference. 
Attendance
is limited to registered participants only.

--------------------------------------------------------
Important Dates for Workshops
--------------------------------------------------------

  OCTOBER 31, 2009 - Proposal Submission Deadline
  NOVEMBER 30, 2009 - Acceptance Notification
  DECEMBER 11, 2009 - Deadline for posting Workshops Call for Papers
  DECEMBER 11, 2009 - AAMAS-2010 Workshops Program Announced
  FEBRUARY,  2, 2010 - Submission of contributions to workshops
  MARCH 2, 2010 - Workshop paper acceptance notification
  MARCH 19, 2010 - Deadline for complete workshop notes submission to 
the workshop chair

Workshop chair

  MARCH 19, 2010 - Deadline for posting a Call for Participation
  MAY 10-11, 2010 - AAMAS-2010 WORKSHOPS

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
AAMAS-2010 Workshops Requirements for Submission
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Proposals for workshops should be a maximum of five pages in length (in 
plain
ASCII text), and should contain the following information:

- Title of the workshop.

- A technical description of the workshop, specifying the workshop 
goals, the
technical issues that it will address,  and the relevance of the 
workshop to
the main conference.

- A discussion of why and to whom the workshop is of interest.

- A list of related workshops held within the last three years, if any, 
and their
relation to the proposed workshop.  Information about previous offerings 
of the
proposed workshop: when and where it has been offered in the past  
(i.e., with AAMAS
or another conference?), organizers names and affiliations, number of 
submissions, 
acceptances and registered attendees, and follow-up publications, if 
any  (e.g., journal
special issue).

- A preliminary workshop agenda and a proposed schedule for organizing 
the workshop.
This should include a brief description of how the organizers intend to 
encourage an
atmosphere appropriate for a workshop.

- Description of paper review process and acceptance standards.

- If available, a list of tentatively confirmed attendees.

- The names, affiliations, postal addresses, phone numbers, and email 
addresses of the
proposed workshop  organizing committee. This committee should consist 
of three or four
people knowledgeable about the technical issues to be addressed. The 
organizing committee
should include individuals from multiple institutions.

-The name of the primary contact for the organizing committee (this 
person must have an
email address).

- A description of the qualifications of the individual committee 
members with respect to
organizing an AAMAS  workshop, including a list of workshops previously 
arranged by any
members of the proposed organizing committee, if any.

- List of potential program committee members, including their title and 
affiliations.

- Expected duration of the workshop (half or full day).

- A list of places (distribution lists, web sites, journals, etc.) where 
the workshop is
planned to be advertised.


All proposals should be submitted by electronic mail, in plain ASCII 
text, to the AAMAS-2010
Workshop Chair:

Kagan Tumer ( kagan.tumer at oregonstate.edu 
<mailto:kagan.tumer at oregonstate.edu> )

as soon as possible but no later than: Saturday October 31, 2009.

Prospective organizers will be notified of the committee's decision
no later than: Monday November 30, 2009.

The selection of the workshops to be included in the final AAMAS program 
will be based upon
multiple factors, including: the scientific/technical interest of the 
topics, the clarity of
the proposal in addressing the requested information, the 
innovativeness  of workshop topics,
the cross-disciplinary nature of the workshop, and the capacity of the 
conference workshop
program. Note that authors of proposals addressing similar and/or 
overlapping content areas
and/or audiences may be requested to merge their proposals.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Responsibilities of AAMAS and workshop organizers
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

For all accepted proposals, AAMAS will be responsible for:

- Providing publicity for the workshop series as a whole.

- Providing logistic support and a meeting place for the workshop.

- Together with the organizers, determining the workshop date and time.


Workshop organizers will be responsible for:

-Setting up a website for the workshop.

-Advertising the workshop and issuing a call for papers (by DECEMBER 
11,  2009) and
a call for participation (by MARCH 19, 2010).

-Collecting and evaluating submissions, notifying authors of acceptance 
or rejection
on a timely basis, and ensuring a transparent and fair selection 
process. All workshop
organizers commit themselves to adopt the same deadlines for paper 
submissions and
notifications of acceptance, i.e.,  FEBRUARY 2, 2010: Submissions of 
contributions
to workshops; MARCH 2, 2010: Notifications

- Making the PDF of the whole workshop notes available to the workshops 
chair by MARCH 19,
2010, as well as a list of audio-visual requirements and any special 
room requirements.
The AAMAS-2010 workshop notes will be included in the  flash drive 
containing the AAMAS-2010
conference proceedings. To that end, please include the following 
sentence in your call for
papers: "Workshop notes including all accepted papers will be 
distributed to AAMAS-2010
registrants in electronic form. Printed workshop notes will NOT be made 
available to workshop
participants."

- Ensuring that the workshop notes or individual papers are available 
from the workshops
websites, as appropriate. Though the workshop notes will appear on the 
flash drive distributed
to conference attendees, the workshop notes will not be hosted on the 
IFAAMAS website.

- Ensuring that the workshop organizers and the participants register 
for the workshop and
are invited to register  to the main conference (at least one author 
must register for the
workshop in order for a paper to appear in the  workshop proceedings).

AAMAS reserves the right to cancel any workshop if the above 
responsibilities are not fulfilled,
or if too few paying attendees register for the workshop to support its 
running costs.

----------------------------------------------
Submissions and Inquiries
----------------------------------------------

Please send proposals and inquiries to:

Kagan Tumer
Oregon State University
kagan.tumer at oregonstate.edu <mailto:kagan.tumer at oregonstate.edu>

 


From btanner at UDel.Edu  Thu Oct  8 08:41:22 2009
From: btanner at UDel.Edu (Bert Tanner)
Date: Thu, 08 Oct 2009 11:41:22 -0400
Subject: [robotics-worldwide] Faculty positions in robotics/control at U of
	Delaware
Message-ID: <4ACE0822.3040706@udel.edu>

Faculty Positions in Mechanical Engineering (all ranks)

The Department of Mechanical Engineering at the University of Delaware 
invites nominations
and applications for three tenure-track faculty positions at the rank of 
assistant professor. Highly
qualified candidates will be considered at the level of associate 
professor or full professor (tenure
or tenure-track).

We are interested in candidates in any discipline of Mechanical 
Engineering but have particular
interests in the general areas of composites, biomedical engineering, 
clean and sustainable
energy, and robotics and control.

Our Center for Composite Materials, which boasts $9M of research funding 
per year and 240
affiliated faculty, staff, post-docs, graduate and undergraduate 
students and interns, provides a
forum for materials, manufacturing and nanotechnology research. 
Biomedical engineering
activities are closely coupled to our Center for Biomedical Engineering 
Research, which has
more than 30 associated faculty members and many NIH grants, including 
an $11M NIH Center
for Biomedical Research Excellence award. In addition, the 
inter-disciplinary effort at the
Delaware Biotechnology Institute encompasses research, education, and 
economic development
in the life sciences with emphasis on human health, complex 
environmental systems and
biomaterials. This $120M initiative is housed in a 72,000 sq ft 
state-of-the-art biotechnology
facility. Sustainable energy activities are closely coupled to our 
Center for Fuel Cell Research,
with research sponsored by Department of Energy, Federal Transit 
Administration, the State of
Delaware, and industry. The research in Robotics and Controls is well 
established and is
supported by multiple NSF awards along with ARO, ARL, AFOSR, NIH and NIST.
Applicants should hold a Ph.D. in mechanical engineering, or closely 
related field. Successful
candidates are expected to have demonstrated excellence in innovative 
research and show the
potential for high quality teaching and mentoring. For positions at 
higher ranks, an outstanding
and internationally recognized research program, along with proven 
high-quality teaching and
mentoring, is required.

Applicants should submit a curriculum vitae, a statement of research and 
teaching interests and
achievements, and a list of at least four references to the Mechanical 
Engineering link at
www.engr.udel.edu/faculty-search (preferred); or send by mail to ME 
Faculty Search
Committee, College of Engineering, University of Delaware, Newark, DE 
19716. Full
consideration is guaranteed for applications received before December 1, 
2009 (postmarked
before 12/1 for applications sent by regular mail) but the search will 
continue until the positions
are filled. The University of Delaware is an equal opportunity employer. 
Women and minorities
are encouraged to apply.

From raj.madhavan at nist.gov  Wed Oct  7 20:49:56 2009
From: raj.madhavan at nist.gov (Raj Madhavan)
Date: Wed, 07 Oct 2009 23:49:56 -0400
Subject: [robotics-worldwide] IEEE-RAS Technical Committee (TC-PEBRAS)
Message-ID: <4ACD6164.9030809@nist.gov>

Formation of the IEEE-RAS Technical Committee on Performance
Evaluation and Benchmarking for Robotic and Automation Systems (TC-PEBRAS)

The Technical Committee on Performance Evaluation and Benchmarking for
Robotic and Automation Systems (TC-PEBRAS) will serve as a forum to
address performance evaluation and benchmarking for robotic and
automation systems, in general. Currently, there is no accepted standard
for quantitatively measuring the performance of intelligent systems ?
particularly robotic or automation systems - against user-defined
requirements; and furthermore, there is no consensus on what objective
evaluation procedures need to be followed to deduce the performance of
these systems. The lack of reproducible and repeatable test methods has
precluded researchers working towards a common goal from exchanging and
communicating results, inter-comparing robot performance, and leveraging
previous work that could otherwise avoid duplication and expedite
technology transfer. This lack of cohesion in the community hinders
progress in many domains, such as manufacturing, service, healthcare,
and security. Quantifying performance via benchmarking and
standardization will improve the utility of robotic and automation
systems in already established application areas. Having agreed-upon
measures of performance and merit is a critical pre-requisite to wider
acceptance and proliferation of emerging technologies. It is our hope
that the efforts of this technical committee will bring together what is
currently an amorphous community to provide a baseline for comparison
and mechanisms for targeting specific aspects of a system thus allowing
researchers and practitioners to assess the performance of various
systems in different scenarios and environmental conditions. The
end-user communities can use this forum to monitor progress in emerging
technologies and to provide input regarding their needs and
requirements. Benchmark and challenge problems in specific technology
areas can be submitted to this TC to stimulate progress in concrete and
directed ways.

Even though the performance evaluation and benchmarking activities might
be carried out under individual TCs pertaining to their specific area,
it is our belief that TC-PEBRAS will serve all the existing TCs by
providing a common forum to address this issue jointly and benefit from
lessons learned. This will lessen the limitations currently faced by
individual TCs and enable steps required to speed up the achievement of
meaningful results by cross-germination and cooperation. TC-PEBRAS will
concentrate on performance aspects of intelligent systems including
software and other influencing factors. We expect to learn from the
experiences and insights of the members of the existing TCs gained both
through their theoretical development and practical implementation of
intelligent systems in a variety of diverse application domains.

We welcome you to join this effort and contribute in any way possible!

For a list of past and upcoming activities, please visit the TC website
at http://tab.ieee-ras.org/committeeinfo.php?tcid=35

*NOTE* The co-chairs of the TC will be available during IROS'09 to meet
with interested folks to answer any questions. Please email us to set up
a mutually convenient time at
raj.madhavan at ieee.org/pobil at icc.uji.es/elena.messina at nist.gov/.

-- 
Raj Madhavan, Ph.D.
Intelligent Systems Division
National Institute of Standards and Technology
100 Bureau Drive, Mail Stop 8230
Gaithersburg, MD 20899-8230.

Tel: (301) 975-2865 Fax: (301) 990-9688
URL: aser.ornl.gov/madhavan/ & www.nist.gov/mel/isd/ks/madhavan.cfm



From Nicolas.Chaillet at ens2m.fr  Fri Oct  9 00:28:22 2009
From: Nicolas.Chaillet at ens2m.fr (Nicolas Chaillet (AS2M))
Date: Fri, 09 Oct 2009 09:28:22 +0200
Subject: [robotics-worldwide] Offer for a Postdoc position
Message-ID: <4ACEE616.9000606@ens2m.fr>

Please find a proposal for a Post-doc position at FEMTO-ST Institute, 
University of Franche-Comt?, Besan?on, France, at the following URL:

http://www.femto-st.fr/~nicolas.chaillet/PostdocFEMTO.pdf


N. Chaillet

-- 
____________________________________________________________________________

Nicolas Chaillet

Professeur ? l'Universit? de Franche-Comt?
http://www.univ-fcomte.fr


Directeur du Dpt Automatique et Syst?mes Micro-M?catroniques (AS2M)
Institut FEMTO-ST UMR CNRS 6174 - UFC / ENSMM / UTBM

Head of the Automatic Control and Micro-Mechatronic Systems Department
FEMTO-ST Institute

FEMTO-ST / AS2M
24, Rue Alain Savary
F - 25000 Besan?on

Tel/Phone : +33 (0)3 81 40 28 11
Tel secr?tariat/Secretariat phone : +33 (0)3 81 40 28 01
Fax : +33 (0)3 81 40 28 09
E-mail : nicolas.chaillet at femto-st.fr

http://www.femto-st.fr/
____________________________________________________________________________



From alexandre.krupa at irisa.fr  Fri Oct  9 02:39:04 2009
From: alexandre.krupa at irisa.fr (Alexandre Krupa)
Date: Fri, 09 Oct 2009 11:39:04 +0200
Subject: [robotics-worldwide] Postdoctoral position at INRIA Rennes,
 France - Physiological motion compensation by visual servoing
 during ultrasound imaging
Message-ID: <4ACF04B8.1090101@irisa.fr>

An postdoctoral position is available in the area of medical robotics
at the French National Institute for Research in Computer Science and 
Control (INRIA).

http://www.irisa.fr/lagadic/documents/position/2009-postdoc-uscomp.html

===========================================

Title: Physiological motion compensation by visual servoing during 
ultrasound imaging

Location: INRIA Rennes ? Bretagne Atlantique, France 
http://www.inria.fr/rennes/index.en.html

Research group: LAGADIC http://www.irisa.fr/lagadic/welcome-eng.html

Address: INRIA Rennes - Bretagne Atlantique - Campus universitaire de 
Beaulieu - 35042 Rennes - France

Starting date: at your earliest convenience

Duration: 20 months

Monthly salary: 2357 Euros (1923 Euros free of tax)

Description of the post-doc position is also available at 
http://www.irisa.fr/lagadic/documents/position/2009-postdoc-uscomp.html

Context:

This post-doctoral position is part of the research project ANR Contint 
USComp funded by the French National Research Agency (ANR).
This project involves a collaboration with the Visages project-team in 
Rennes, LSIIT in Strasbourg and LIRMM in Montpellier.
Its goal is to provide methodological solutions allowing real-time 
compensation of the motion of living soft tissues during ultrasound 
imaging.

The proposed approach consists in synchronizing the displacement of a 2D 
or 3D ultrasound sensor in such a way to stabilize the observed
image thanks to a robotized probe holder.
This project deals with the complete signal process of the system, 
including perception of the environment and robot control.
The problematic concerns more specially the use in the control scheme of 
the per-operative ultrasound image,
the interaction force between the probe and the soft tissues and the 
measurements of external signals providing the breathing state of the 
patient.

Mission:

The main goal of this postdoc is to propose new visual servoing 
techniques based on ultrasound images to automatically synchronize
the displacement of a robotized ultrasound probe with the soft tissue 
motion.

Activities of the postdoc are:

- To determine the visual features that can be extracted from live 
segmented ultrasound images
and that are pertinent to perform the robotic task of soft tissue motion 
stabilization.

- To model the interaction that links the variation of the retained 
visual features to the probe displacements.

- To design a kinematic control law using the developed interaction 
model in order to move the robot holding the probe
in such a way to automatically follow a soft tissue element of interest.

- To implement the proposed methods and the developments performed by 
the LIRMM and LSIIT partners related to the control part of the robotic 
system.
These developments respectively concern the force control of the 
robotized probe and the extension of the control with a predictive 
control scheme
using the measurement of physiological signals of the patient for fast 
motion compensation capability.

The developed methods will be tested and validated on an experimental 
setup made up of an ultrasound probe mounted
on a six degrees of freedom ?Hyppocrate? medical robot. In first 
experiments a six-axis ?Adept Viper? robot will also be used to apply
simulated physiological motion to ultrasound phantom in order to 
simulate soft tissue motion.
If first results are convincing, experiments on human will be performed 
using the ?Hyppocrate? safe medical robot.

Requirements:

- Competences in robotics and in computer vision are strongly required.
- Competences in visual servoing, control and image processing are 
highly recommended.
- An excellent practice in C++ programming is also required.

Applications:

Applications must include a letter of candidature, a brief vitae, a 
publication list and a letter of recommendation.
Applications have to be sent by e-mail to alexandre.krupa at irisa.fr

Contact:

Alexandre Krupa
Phone: (+33) 2 99 84 25 85
E-mail: alexandre.krupa at irisa.fr


===========================================

-- 
Alexandre Krupa, Lagadic Group, IRISA/INRIA Rennes - Bretagne Atlantique
Campus universitaire de Beaulieu 35042 Rennes cedex France
Tel:  +33 (0)2.99.84.25.85, Fax: +33 (0)2.99.84.71.71
E-mail: alexandre.krupa at irisa.fr, web: http://www.irisa.fr/lagadic


From giovanni.stellin at telerobot.it  Fri Oct  9 05:50:39 2009
From: giovanni.stellin at telerobot.it (Giovanni Stellin)
Date: Fri, 9 Oct 2009 14:50:39 +0200
Subject: [robotics-worldwide] Request: submission to robotics-worldwide
	mailing list
Message-ID: <3D8AD83ED3B749A3A98090F7090DD980@telerobot.local>

Dear Sirs,
I would like to submit to the mailing list the call for a Marie Curie ER position at Telerobot (www.telerobot.it). Here below there is the text:

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
TELEROBOT CALL FOR RobotDoc ITN

1 Position as Marie Curie Experienced Researcher (2 years)

 

Foreword

RobotDoc (Robotics for Development of Cognition) is a multi-national doctoral training network for the interdisciplinary training on developmental cognitive robotics. The RobotDoc network consists of an excellent balance of academic and industrial partners, and of European and international laboratory leaders in developmental cognitive robotics. The network activities will have a significant impact on the career perspectives of the Fellows through training opportunities on industrial and academic research projects and skills. This network is funded by the European Union Marie Curie program ITN Initial Training Network.

 

TELEROBOT

TELEROBOT is a well-established robotics and industrial automation SME based in Genoa, Italy. The company provides a unique example of innovation within an industry that, due to technological evolution, has undergone a progressive trend of specialization in design and prototyping. TELEROBOT aims to provide "turnkey" solutions in the supply of products, services, research and development within the areas of mechatronics, special and advanced robotics and special automatic equipment.

TELEROBOT inherits an important tradition originated within the Finmeccanica group; over the years, its mission was to promote, commercialize and perform R&D in the field of advanced robotics by targeting ground, sea and space applications for the Italian as well as international markets. Currently TELEROBOT supplies application development and design services, product development, simulation and technical consulting in the fields of machine-applied mechanics, industrial automation and mechatronics.

For further details please go to www.telerobot.it 


Criteria for eligibility of the researcher

 

Experienced researchers: means researchers: 1) already in possession of a doctoral degree, independently of the time taken to acquire it or 2) having at least 4 years of research experience (full-time equivalent) after obtaining the degree which formally allows them to embark on a doctorate in the country in which the degree/diploma was obtained or in the country where the initial training activities are provided

 

The following international mobility conditions apply:

The researcher shall not be a national of a State in which the beneficiary's research team

appointing him/her is located. In the case of a researcher holding more than one nationality, he/she will be able to be hosted by a beneficiary located in the country of his/her nationality in which (s)he has not resided during the previous 5 years.

At the time of appointment, the researcher may not have resided or carried out his/her main activity in the country of the beneficiary for more than 12 months in the 3 years immediately prior to his/her appointment. Short stays such as holidays are not taken into account. As an exception to the general rule, a researcher holding the nationality from a Member State or an Associated Country can carry out his/her initial training activities in his/her country of nationality if s/he can provide evidence testifying that s/he has legally resided and had his/her main activity in a non -Associated third country for at least three of the last four years immediately prior to his/her appointment.

 

Further details for applying at TELEROBOT:

The Marie Curie ER scholarship will last 2 years and the work place will be in Genova, Italy. A mechanical/mechatronic engineering background will be strongly preferred. Stages over other partner sites or Telerobot own sites are forecasted. For further details please refer to:

 http://ec.europa.eu/research/fp7/understanding/marie-curieinbrief/home_en.html;

http://www.robotdoc.org

or contact Dr Francesco Becchi (francesco.becchi at telerobot.it).



Application deadline (TELEROBOT only):

Start of the training is forecasted for early January 2010.

Application deadlines vary, and you are advised to contact each partner leader (francesco.becchi at telerobot.it) before November 30th 2009.

 


Other references

 Other partner institutions and PhD studentships available:

UNIVERSITY OF PLYMOUTH, UK: 2 PhD studentships (contact Prof Angelo Cangelosi  acangelosi at plymouth.ac.uk) 

UNIVERSITY OF Z?RICH, Switzerland: 2 PhD studentships (contact Prof Rolf Pfeifer pfeifer at ifi.uzh.ch)

ITALIAN INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY, Italy: 1 PhD studentship (contact Prof Giorgio Metta Giorgio.metta at iit.it)

UNIVERSITY OF SK?VDE, Sweden, 2 PhD studentships (contact Prof Tom Ziemke tom.ziemke at his.se)

BIELEFELD UNIVERSITY, Germany, 2 PhD studentships (contact Prof. Britta Wrede bwrede at techfak.uni-bielefeld.de)

UNIVERSITY OF SUNDERLAND, UK, 2 PhD studentships (contact Prof. Stefan Wermter stefan.wermter at sunderland.ac.uk)

UPPSALA UNIVERSITY, Sweden, 2 PhD studentships (contact Prof. Claes von Hofsten claes.von_hofsten at psyk.uu.se)

 

Associate partner institutions (where PhD students can spend part of their study:


RIKEN Brain Science Institute, Japan (Prof Jun Tani)

Yale University, USA (Prof Brian Scassellati)

National Taiwan University of Science and Technology, Taiwan (Prof Jerry Lin)

Honda European Research Institute, Germany (Dr Christian Goerick)

BARA British Automation and Robot Association, UK (Dr Paul Robinson) 

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------



Thank you in advance



Giovanni Stellin



Giovanni Stellin, PhD

Senior Research Manager
TELEROBOT srl
Via Semini 28C 16163 GENOVA
Tel  ++39 010 25 18 057
Fax ++39 010 24 62 976
giovanni.stellin at telerobot.it
skype: giovanni_stellin
www.telerobot.it

From valentin.polishchuk at cs.helsinki.fi  Sat Oct 10 00:34:24 2009
From: valentin.polishchuk at cs.helsinki.fi (Valentin Polishchuk)
Date: Sat, 10 Oct 2009 10:34:24 +0300
Subject: [robotics-worldwide] SoCG 2010 - Call for Papers, Videos,
	and Multimedia
Message-ID: <246693af0910100034j28926a04k65815f6f4a57a44d@mail.gmail.com>

-----------------------------------------------------------------------
 CALL FOR PAPERS, VIDEOS, AND MULTIMEDIA
-----------------------------------------------------------------------

    26th Annual Symposium on Computational Geometry (SoCG 2010)

        June 13-16, 2010
        Snowbird, Utah, USA
        In cooperation with ACM SIGACT and SIGGRAPH

        http://www.sci.utah.edu/socg2010/


The Twenty-sixth Annual Symposium on Computational Geometry will be
held at Snowbird, Utah.  We invite submissions of high-quality papers,
videos, and multimedia presentations describing original research
addressing computational problems in a geometric setting, in
particular their algorithmic solutions, implementation issues,
applications, and mathematical foundations.

The topics of the Symposium reflect the rich diversity of research
interests in computational geometry. They are intended to highlight
both the depth and scope of computational geometry, and to invite
fruitful interactions with other disciplines. Topics of interest
include, but are not limited to:
   *  design, analysis, and implementation of geometric algorithms and
data structures; lower bounds on the computational complexity of
geometric problems;
   * mathematical, numerical, and algebraic issues arising in the
formulation, analysis, implementation, and experimental evaluation of
geometric algorithms and heuristics; discrete and combinatorial
geometry; computational topology;
   * novel algorithmic applications of geometry in computer graphics,
geometric modeling, computer-aided design and manufacturing,
scientific computing, geographic information systems, database
systems, robotics, computational biology, machine learning, sensor
networks, medical imaging, combinatorial optimization, statistical
analysis, discrete differential geometry, theoretical computer
science, graph drawing, pure mathematics, and other fields.



----- Important Dates -----

   * November  23, 2009:   Paper titles and (short) abstracts due
   * December 02, 2009:  Full submissions due  (23:59, Honolulu time)
   * February 15, 2010: Notification of acceptance/rejection of papers
   * February, 19, 2010:  Video and multimedia submissions due
   * March 01, 2010:  Notification of acceptance or rejection of
video/multimedia submissions
   * March 15, 2010: Camera-ready papers and video/multimedia abstracts due
   * April 20, 2010:  Final versions of video/multimedia presentations due
   * June 13-16, 2010: Symposium at Snowbird, Utah

----- Local Arrangements Co-Chairs ------

    * Valerio Pascucci (University of Utah)
    * Suresh Venkatasubramanian (University of Utah)

---------------------------------------------------------------------
CALL FOR PAPERS
---------------------------------------------------------------------

We invite submissions of high-quality papers describing original
research on geometric algorithms and data structures, their
mathematical foundations and correctness, their implementation, and
their applications.

The program committee explicitly encourages the submission of video or
multimedia in support of submitted papers. Authors may wish to
consider making a separate submission to the video/multimedia track
(see the guidelines below). Papers and video/multimedia submissions
will be reviewed separately; acceptance or rejection of one will not
influence acceptance or rejection of the other.

Final versions of accepted papers will be published by ACM in the
symposium proceedings. Proceedings will be distributed to symposium
participants and will also be available from ACM for purchase or
through the digital library. An author of each accepted paper will be
expected to attend the Symposium and give a presentation
(approximately 20 minutes) of the paper.  Authors of a selection of
papers from the conference will be invited to submit extended versions
of their papers to a special issue of one or more journals.

----- Paper Submission -----

All submissions should be made electronically; see the EasyChair
SoCG2010 web pages http://www.easychair.org/conferences/?conf=socg2010
for detailed submission instructions. If electronic submission is not
feasible, please contact the program committee chair, David
Kirkpatrick <socg-chair at cs.ubc.ca>,  well in advance of the submission
deadlines.

----- Submission Guidelines ------

Papers should be submitted in the form of an extended abstract, which
begins with the title of the paper, each author's name, affiliation,
and e-mail address. This should be followed by a precise statement of
the problem considered, a succinct summary of the results obtained
(emphasizing the significance, novelty, and potential impact of the
research), and a clear comparison with related work. The remainder of
the extended abstract should provide sufficient detail to allow the
program committee to evaluate the validity, quality, and relevance of
the contribution. Clarity of presentation is very important; the whole
extended abstract should be written carefully, taking into
consideration that it will be read and evaluated by both experts and
non-experts, often under tight time constraints.

Submissions should be typeset in single column format, using 11-point
or larger font, with at least 1 inch/2.54 cm margins and single line
spacing. Excluding the title page and bibliography, the extended
abstract must not exceed 10 pages. Submissions deviating from these
guidelines risk rejection without consideration of their merits.

A clearly marked appendix (of reasonable length) containing additional
technical details may be included directly in the submission. Other
supporting materials, such as an expanded version of the paper, a
video or multimedia presentation, source code, or experimental data,
may be provided by including a URL in the submission. Appendices and
other supporting materials will not be regarded as part of the actual
submission and will be considered only at the discretion of the
program committee.

Authors must submit the title and a short abstract of their paper by
November 23, 2009. This pre-submission will be used to help make
program committee reading assignments. Extended abstracts must be
received by December 2, 2009 (23:59, Honolulu time). There will be no
extension of this deadline; late submissions will not be considered.
Authors will be notified of acceptance or rejection by February 15,
2010. Final versions of accepted submissions will be due by March 15,
2010 for inclusion in the proceedings. The final proceedings papers
must be formatted in accordance with ACM proceedings guidelines; LaTeX
style files will be made available to authors of accepted papers.

Concurrent submission of the same (or essentially the same) abstract
to SoCG and to another conference with published proceedings is not
allowed. An extended abstract of a paper that is under journal review,
or scheduled for publication in a journal after June 2010, may be
submitted, when it is clear that the extended abstract differs
substantially from the journal version. In such cases, the authors
must include the journal version in an appendix that clearly
identifies the status of the journal submission.


----- Program Committee -----

   * Hee-Kap Ahn (POSTECH, Korea)
   * Nina Amenta (University of California, Davis, USA)
   * Tetsuo Asano (JAIST, Japan)
   * Sergey Bereg (University of Texas at Dallas, USA)
   * Therese Biedl (University of Waterloo, Canada)
   * Robert Bridson (University of British Columbia, Canada)
   * Erin Chambers (Saint Louis University, USA)
   * Hazel Everett (University Nancy 2, France)
   * Sandor Fekete (Braunschweig University of Technology, Germany)
   * Efi Fogel (Tel Aviv University, Israel)
   * David Kirkpatrick, Chair (University of British Columbia, Canada)
   * Valentin Polishchuk (Helsinki Institute for Information Technology,
Finland)
   * Raimund Seidel (Saarland University, Germany)
   * Bettina Speckmann (TU Eindhoven, The Netherlands)
   * Csaba Toth (University of Calgary, Canada)
   * Chee Yap (Courant Institute, NYU, USA)

---------------------------------------------------------------------
CALL FOR VIDEO AND MULTIMEDIA PRESENTATIONS
19th Annual Video/Multimedia Review of Computational Geometry
---------------------------------------------------------------------

Video and multimedia presentations are sought for the 19th Annual
Video and Multimedia Review of Computational Geometry. This review
showcases the use of visualization in computational geometry for
exposition and education, for the visual exploration of geometry in
research, and as an interface and a debugging tool in software
development. Algorithm animations, visual explanations of structural
theorems, descriptions of applications of computational geometry, and
demonstrations of software systems are all appropriate.

Three to five minutes is ideal for most animations and presentations
of applications; eight minutes is the upper limit. Submissions of
movie clips in QuickTime or MPEG-4 compressed formats (e.g., XviD or
DivX version 6) are encouraged.  For ease of sharing and viewing, we
encourage (but it is not required) that each submission be uploaded to
YouTube, and that the corresponding url be supplied along with the
submission.  Consider adding a subtitle track to movie clips. We also
encourage submissions of Macromedia Flash, Java applets, and limited
forms of other multimedia or software. These formats must come with a
script that will allow them to be distributed in both interactive and
canned QT or MPEG movie formats. In case of doubt, please email the
Video and Multimedia Program chair. Some suggestions on making movie
clips can be found at
http://www.ams.sunysb.edu/~jsbm/SoCG10/video_suggestions.html.

Accepted video and multimedia presentations will have an abstract in
the published conference proceedings; video/multimedia authors will
have an opportunity to present their work at the conference during a
dedicated video session. Accepted presentations will be available
online in various formats in a web proceedings. (The 2009 video
proceedings are available at
http://www.computational-geometry.org/SoCG-videos/socg09video/.)

----- Video/Multimedia Submission -----

Video/multimedia submissions should be sent by e-mail to the
Video/Multimedia committee chair, Joe Mitchell
(mitchell at compgeom.com), to arrive by 23:59, New York time, Friday,
February 19, 2010.

The author(s) should submit a one or two-page description of the
material shown in the presentation, and where applicable, the
techniques used in the implementation. An email address of the
corresponding author and a URL or ftp address where the supporting
materials can be retrieved must be included. The final two-page
descriptions must be formatted according to the guidelines for ACM
proceedings; LaTeX style files will be provided to authors of accepted
presentations.

We explicitly encourage video/multimedia submissions that support
papers submitted to the symposium. Submitted papers and associated
video/multimedia submissions will be treated entirely separately by
the respective committees: acceptance or rejection of one will not
influence acceptance or rejection of the other.

Authors will be notified of acceptance or rejection, and given
reviewers' comments by March 1, 2010. For each accepted submission,
the final version of the 2-page textual description will be due by
March 15, 2010 (electronically) for inclusion in the proceedings.
Final versions of accepted video/multimedia presentations will be due
April 20, 2010 in the best format available.




----- Video and Multimedia Presentation Program Committee -----

   * Tamal Dey (Ohio State University)
   * David Eppstein (UC Irvine)
   * Jie Gao (Stony Brook)
   * David Gu (Stony Brook)
   * George Hart (Stony Brook)
   * Joe Mitchell, Chair (Stony Brook)
   * Jonathan  Shewchuk (UC Berkeley)
   * Monique Teillaud (INRIA Sophia Antipolis - M?diterran?e)

---------------------------------------------------------------------
---------------------------------------------------------------------
SOCG Steering Committee (2009-2012)

   * Jack Snoeyink, Chair  (University of North Carolina)
   * Mark de Berg, Secretary (TU Eindhoven)
   * Joe Mitchell (SUNY Stony Brook)
   * Guenter Rote (FU Berlin)
   * Monique Teillaud (INRIA Sophia Antipolis - M?diterran?e)

From rvelazquez at ags.up.mx  Sat Oct 10 16:38:54 2009
From: rvelazquez at ags.up.mx (Ramiro Velazquez)
Date: Sat, 10 Oct 2009 18:38:54 -0500
Subject: [robotics-worldwide] CfP Special Issue on Assistive and
	Rehabilitation Robotics - jABB
Message-ID: <11958530910101638m11c1da49y1e4639d66db4e292@mail.gmail.com>

==============================================
CALL FOR PAPERS
Special Issue on Assistive and Rehabilitation Robotics
Journal of Applied Bionics and Biomechanics
Taylor & Francis (ISSN: 1176- 2322)
http://www.tandf.co.uk/journals/titles/11762322.asp
==============================================

Dear colleague,

You are kindly invited to submit your work to this special issue of
Applied Bionics and Biomechanics.

The purpose of this special issue is to address assistive and
rehabilitation robotics, systems and technologies for the special
care-needed people including the elderly and people with disabilities.

Original high-quality and previously unpublished research papers on
all these aspects are invited, including - but not limited to - the
following topics:

- Assistive/rehabilitation devices for the motor-disabled
- Assistive/rehabilitation devices for the blind/visually impaired
- Assistive/rehabilitation devices for the deaf
- Assistive/rehabilitation devices for the intellectual/language disabled
- Clinical practice of assistive/rehabilitation robotics
- Haptics in assistive/rehabilitation engineering

Prospective authors are invited to follow the journal submission guidelines:
http://www.tandf.co.uk/journals/authors/tbobauth.asp
All articles will undergo rigorous peer review.

==================
IMPORTANT DATES:
==================
* Intention of submission: November 6, 2009
(Please send an email to guest editors with the tentative title of
your paper, the authors and their affiliation. This is only for
planning and internal use.)
* Full paper submissions due: January 15, 2010
* Notification of acceptance: March 15, 2010
* Revised version: April 15, 2010
* Tentative Publication: June 2010

Guest editors

Ramiro Velazquez (MCS, Universidad Panamericana, Mexico).
Email: rvelazquez at ags.up.mx
Edwige Pissaloux (ISIR, Universit? Paris 6, France).
Email : Edwige.Pissaloux at upmc.fr

Sincerely

-- 
Ramiro Vel?zquez, Dr.
=================================================
Profesor Asistente | Assistant Professor
Mecatr?nica y Control de Sistemas
Universidad Panamericana - Escuela de Ingenier?a
Fracc. R?sticos Calpulli. C.P. 20290
Aguascalientes, Ags., MEXICO
Tel: (52-449) 910-6200 ext. 7304
Web: www.up.edu.mx
Homepage: www.robotica-up.org/~ramiro.html
=================================================

From rjwood at eecs.harvard.edu  Sun Oct 11 17:19:01 2009
From: rjwood at eecs.harvard.edu (Rob Wood)
Date: Sun, 11 Oct 2009 20:19:01 -0400
Subject: [robotics-worldwide] postdoctoral research position in the Harvard
	Microrobotics Lab
Message-ID: <7D3230F3-7448-4509-AECB-38E5C449F42D@eecs.harvard.edu>

Position open in the area of 'active soft materials'.  for  
description, see:

http://micro.seas.harvard.edu/opportunities.html

------------------------------
Robert Wood
Assistant Professor
School of Engineering and
	Applied Sciences
Harvard University
(617) 496-1341

The Harvard Microrobotics Lab
http://micro.seas.harvard.edu
(617) 384-7892
-------------------------------


From ECCCheah at ntu.edu.sg  Sun Oct 11 23:41:09 2009
From: ECCCheah at ntu.edu.sg (CHEAH Chien Chern)
Date: Mon, 12 Oct 2009 14:41:09 +0800
Subject: [robotics-worldwide] CALL FOR PAPERS: IEEE INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE
 ON ROBOTICS, AUTOMATION AND MECHATRONICS (RAM)
Message-ID: <4EA83AA20D28A8418A9ABFD14F5843C205FAD57F44@EXCHANGE31.staff.main.ntu.edu.sg>


4th IEEE INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE ON ROBOTICS, AUTOMATION AND MECHATRONICS (RAM)
Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
7-9 JUNE, 2010
HTTP://WWW.CIS-RAM.ORG/2010/

OBJECTIVES:  The goal of the RAM 2010 is to bring together experts from the field of robotics, automation and mechatronics to discuss on the state-of-the-art and to present new research findings and perspectives of future developments with respect to the conference themes. The RAM 2010 is held in conjunction with the IEEE International Conference on Cybernetics and Intelligent Systems (CIS 2010). The conference welcomes paper submissions from academics, researchers, engineers, and students worldwide in but not limited to the following areas:

Robotics and Automation in Unstructured Environment, Personal and Service Robotics, Underwater Robotics, Medical Robots and Systems, Robotics and Automation Applications, Sensor Design, Integration, and Fusion, Computer and Robot Vision, Human-Robot Interfaces, Haptics, Teleoperation, Telerobotics, and Network Robotics, Micro/Nano, Distributed, Cellular, and Multi Robots, Biologically-Inspired Robots and Systems, Sensor Based Robotics, Intelligent Transportation Systems, Modeling, Planning and Control, Kinematics, Mechanics, and Mechanism Design, Legged Robots, Wheeled Mobile Robots, Dynamics, Motion Control, Force/Impedance Control, Architecture and Programming, Methodologies for Robotics and Automation, Discrete Event Dynamic Systems, Petri Nets, Virtual Reality, Manufacturing System Architecture, Design, and Performance Evaluation, Computer Aided Production Planning, Scheduling, and Control, Total Quality Management, Maintenance, and Diagnostics, etc.

About Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia A delightful mix of cross-cultural influences and traditions, Kuala Lumpur radiates an exciting, enticing charm, which will no doubt pique your interest throughout your stay. Kuala Lumpur, affectionately known as KL, is an amazing cultural melting pot. Here, you will wander through communities of Chinese, Malays, South Indians, East Malaysian ethnic groups, Thais, Indonesians, Sikhs and a huge community of expats. Each community while influencing each other's culture, offers its own festivals, food, music, art and fashion. KL has a lively nightlife scene and a fascinating art and performance culture, which blends contemporary and traditional styles from many backgrounds. More detailed information is available on the following website: http:// www.tourism.gov.my/en/destinations/state.asp?state=kl.


Invited Sessions:
The conference will feature invited sessions on specialized topics of interests. The invited sessions are intended to usher in, in-depth discussions in special areas relevant to the conference theme. The session organizers will coordinate the associated review process. The conference proceedings will include all papers from the invited sessions.


Paper Submission: Papers must be written in English and should describe original work. Papers should be submitted in the.PDF format to http:// www.cis-ram.org/2010/onl-pap.html by January 15, 2010. The length of the paper is limited to a maximum of 6 pages (US letter size, single spacing, Times Roman of font size 10, double columns format), including figures, tables and references. Upon acceptance, authors will be required to register and present their papers. Papers will be published in the conference proceedings only if at least one of the authors is officially registered. All the papers in the conference proceedings will be indexed in the IEEE Library, ISI Proceedings, and EI Compendex database.

Important Deadlines:

Conference / Invited Session Paper Submission:  15 January 2010
Notification of Acceptance:                             1 March 2010
Final Camera-Ready Manuscript:                  1 April 2010



CONFIDENTIALITY: This email is intended solely for the person(s) named. The contents may be confidential and/or privileged. If you are not the intended recipient, please delete it, notify us, and do not copy or use it, nor disclose its contents. Thank you.

Towards A Sustainable Earth: Print Only When Necessary

From mpd37 at cam.ac.uk  Mon Oct 12 02:47:03 2009
From: mpd37 at cam.ac.uk (Marc Deisenroth)
Date: Mon, 12 Oct 2009 11:47:03 +0200
Subject: [robotics-worldwide] Final call for contributions - NIPS workshop
 on Probabilistic Approaches for Robotics and Control
Message-ID: <4AD2FB17.6060205@cam.ac.uk>


################################################################
                    FINAL CALL FOR CONTRIBUTIONS

                          NIPS workshop on
       *Probabilistic Approaches for Robotics and Control*
                 supported by PASCAL 2 (core event)
################################################################

*Workshop dates*
Friday, December 11, 2009

*Workshop location*
Whistler, B.C., Canada, at the Westin Resort and Spa and the
Hilton Whistler Resort and Spa



*Poster submission*

Please send an extended abstract of max. 1 page describing the
poster you intend to present to
mpd37 at cam.ac.uk
Choose a format of your liking, e.g., the standard NIPS
template.

The *deadline for abstract submissions* is
October 17, 2009.

The *notification* will be
October 26, 2009.

*Workshop homepage*
http://mlg.eng.cam.ac.uk/marc/nipsWS09


*Conference homepage*
http://nips.cc


*Workshop Abstract*

During the last decade, many areas of Bayesian machine learning have
reached a high level of maturity. This has resulted in a variety of
theoretically sound and efficient algorithms for learning and
inference in the presence of uncertainty. However, in the context of
control, robotics, and reinforcement learning, uncertainty has not yet
been treated with comparable rigor despite its central role in
risk-sensitive control, sensorimotor control, robust control, and
cautious control. A consistent treatment of uncertainty is also
essential when dealing with stochastic policies, incomplete state
information, and exploration strategies.

A typical situation where uncertainty comes into play is when the
exact state transition dynamics are unknown and only limited or no
expert knowledge is available and/or affordable. One option is to
learn a model from data. However, if the model is too far off, this
approach can result in arbitrarily bad solutions. This model bias can
be sidestepped by the use of flexible model-free methods. The
disadvantage of model-free methods is that they do not generalize and
often make less efficient use of data. Therefore, they often need more
trials than feasible to solve a problem on a real-world system. A
probabilistic model could be used for efficient use of data while
alleviating model bias by explicitly representing and incorporating
uncertainty.

The use of probabilistic approaches requires (approximate) inference
algorithms, where Bayesian machine learning can come into
play. Although probabilistic modeling and inference conceptually fit
into this context, they are not widespread in robotics, control, and
reinforcement learning. Hence, this workshop aims to bring researchers
together to discuss the need, the theoretical properties, and the
practical implications of probabilistic methods in control, robotics,
and reinforcement learning.

One particular focus will be on probabilistic reinforcement learning
approaches that profit recent developments in optimal control which
show that the problem can be substantially simplified if certain
structure is imposed. The simplifications include linearity of the
(Hamilton-Jacobi) Bellman equation. The duality with Bayesian
estimation allow for analytical computation of the optimal control
laws and closed form expressions of the optimal value functions.
Format

The workshop will consist of short invited presentations and a session
with contributed posters (plus poster spotlight). Topics (from a
theoretical and practical perspective) to be addressed include, but
are not limited to:

- How can we efficiently plan and act in the presence of uncertainty
   in states/rewards/observations/environment?

- Shall we model the lack of knowledge or can we simply ignore it?

- How can prior knowledge (e.g., expert knowledge and domain
   knowledge) be incorporated?

- How much manual tuning and human insight (e.g., domain
   knowledge) is a) required and b) available to achieve good
   performance?

- Is there a principled way to account for imprecise models and
   model bias?

- What roles should probabilistic models play in control? Are they
   needed at all?

- What kinds of probabilistic models are useful?

- In traditional control, hand-crafted control laws often prevail
   since optimal control laws are mostly too aggressive due to
   model errors while robust control laws can be too conservative
   since they always assume the worst case. Can "probabilistic
   control" bridge the gap between robust and optimal control laws?

- How can we exploit the linearity of the (Hamilton-Jacobi) Bellman
   equation and the duality with Bayesian estimation?

- Can we compute the optimal control law analytically and is there a
   closed-form expression of the value function?

- How can existing machine learning methods be applied to efficiently
   solve stochastic control problems?


*Invited speakers*

Dieter Fox (University of Washington), confirmed
Drew Bagnell (CMU), pending
Evangelos Theodorou (USC), confirmed
Jovan Popovic (MIT), confirmed
Konrad Koerding (Northwestern University), confirmed
Marc Toussaint (TU Berlin), confirmed
Miroslav Karny (Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic), confirmed
Nick Roy (MIT), confirmed
Roderick Murray-Smith (University of Glasgow), confirmed
Bert Kappen (University of Nijmegen), confirmed
Emanuel Todorov (University of Washington), confirmed


*Support*
The workshop is supported by PASCAL2 (core event) and the Technical
Committee on Robot Learning


*Organizers*

Marc Peter Deisenroth
Bert Kappen
Emanuel Todorov
Duy Nguyen-Tuong
Carl Edward Rasmussen
Jan Peters


From rvoyles at du.edu  Tue Oct 13 11:16:31 2009
From: rvoyles at du.edu (Richard Voyles)
Date: Tue, 13 Oct 2009 12:16:31 -0600
Subject: [robotics-worldwide] SSRR - Call for Participation
Message-ID: <9B0FA21921674A02B51CBD7FA0137269@richardd620>



2009 International Workshop on Safety, Security and Rescue Robotics

University of Denver

Denver, Colorado, USA

November 3-5, 2009


The 2009 IEEE International Workshop on Safety, Security, and Rescue
Robotics is dedicated to identifying and solving the key issues necessary to
field capable robots across a variety of challenging applications. This
seventh workshop in the series will address both the research challenges
posed by search and rescue scenarios and the design of deployable robotic
systems that satisfy user-defined requirements. It will create a unique
opportunity for development and exchange of research ideas and technical
solutions. As always, emergency responders and other expected users will be
involved in presentations and discussions to ensure the practical relevance
of technology developments for actual usage.


Check out the program on the website below:

http://www.engr.du.edu/ssrr2009/

then spend the weekend skiing in the Rockies! Loveland and Arapahoe Basin
ski resorts are already open.



_______________________________________________________
2390 S. York Street? | (303) 871-2481
CMK 200??????????????| rvoyles at du.edu
Denver, CO? 80208??? | www.du.edu/~rvoyles




From tenorth at cs.tum.edu  Thu Oct 15 01:39:45 2009
From: tenorth at cs.tum.edu (Moritz Tenorth)
Date: Thu, 15 Oct 2009 10:39:45 +0200
Subject: [robotics-worldwide] Introducing the TUM Kitchen Data Set of
	Everyday Manipulation Activities
In-Reply-To: <4AD5954A.20601@cs.tum.edu>
References: <4AD5954A.20601@cs.tum.edu>
Message-ID: <4AD6DFD1.7060508@cs.tum.edu>


Dear all,

in this mail, we'd like to point you to the novel TUM Kitchen Data Set
which provides multi-modal observations of human activities in a kitchen
context. It currently consists of 21 sequences of 4 subjects performing
table setting tasks. The data set has first been presented at the THEMIS
workshop in conjunction with ICCV and was well received by the audience.

==> http://kitchendata.cs.tum.edu <==

By providing the data, we hope to foster research in the areas of
marker-less human motion capture, motion segmentation and human activity
recognition. We recorded the data to overcome limitations of many of
today's data sets, some of which can be regarded as a solved problem,
others lack complexity or realism of the observed activities.

The data set comprises the following modalities:

     * Video data from four fixed, overhead cameras (384x288 pixels RGB
       color or 780x582 pixels raw Bayer pattern, at 25Hz)
     * Motion capture data (*.bvh file format) extracted from the videos
       using our marker-less full-body MeMoMan tracker
       <http://memoman.cs.tum.edu>
     * RFID tag readings from three fixed readers embedded in the
       environment (sample rate 2Hz)
     * Magnetic (reed) sensors detecting when a door or drawer is opened.
       (sample rate 10Hz)
     * Action labels (the data is labeled separately for the left hand,
       the right hand, and the trunk of the person)

A more detailed documentation of the data set is provided on-line at
http://kitchendata.cs.tum.edu and in the paper

The TUM Kitchen Data Set of Everyday Manipulation Activities for
Motion Tracking and Action Recognition. Moritz Tenorth, Jan Bandouch, 
Michael Beetz. IEEE Int. Workshop on Tracking Humans for the Evaluation 
of their Motion in Image Sequences (THEMIS). In conjunction with ICCV2009.

If you have any questions or propositions, feel free to contact us!

Best regards,
Moritz Tenorth, Jan Bandouch

From mail at jan-peters.net  Thu Oct 15 06:35:40 2009
From: mail at jan-peters.net (Jan Peters)
Date: Thu, 15 Oct 2009 15:35:40 +0200
Subject: [robotics-worldwide] PostDoc Position: Learning to Grasp with Motor
	Primitives
Message-ID: <BCDF2039-B5E3-43C7-BE56-4BB6AFFEDEE8@jan-peters.net>

We are searching for a PostDoc at the Robot Learning Lab of the
Department of Empirical Inference, at the Max Planck Institute for
Biological Cybernetics, T?bingen, Germany.

If you or one of your students is graduating within the next five-six
month and is searching for a position that involves robot grasping,
application of machine learning in robotics and motor primitive
learning, then please contact Jan Peters (mail at jan-peters.net)
informally by email!

For more information on the institute see http://www.kyb.tuebingen.mpg.de
and on our past projects in robot learning see http://www.robot-learning.de
or http://www.jan-peters.net

Best wishes,
Jan Peters


PostDoc Position
=============

The Department of Empirical Inference, headed by Bernhard Sch?lkopf,  
at the Max Planck Institute for Biological Cybernetics, T?bingen,  
Germany, intends to fill an open Post-Doc position in the EU Project  
GeRT.

Applications are encouraged in area of robot learning. We are looking  
for persons with a strong background in one or several of the  
following areas:

* robot grasping
* application of machine learning in robotics
* motor primitive learning

The Post-Doc will work on the EU Project GeRT in the robot learning  
group headed by Jan Peters for a duration
of up to 3 years. Latest date for application submission is January  
15th.

Applicants should hold a PhD in computer science, engineering or  
related fields and have an outstanding publication record at the  
relevant conferences (e.g., ICRA, IROS, R:SS, NIPS) and journals  
(e.g., IJRR, IEEE TRO, Autonomous Robots, JMLR, Machine Learning). We  
are looking for highly motivated and creative individuals who enjoy  
collaborating in a team of researchers with various cultural and  
scientific backgrounds. Applicants should be capable of conducting  
independent research, willing to (co-)supervise PhD students, and  
contribute to the success of our group as a whole.
The working language in our group is English.

The Department for Empirical Inference is a young and energetic  
machine learning group. The Max Planck Institute for Biological  
Cybernetics provides an excellent research environment in all respects.
The robot learning lab is present both in the core robotics and in the  
machine learning community.

Applications should include a statement of research experience and  
interests, a CV, and contact details of at least two referees. Please  
send your applications in electronic form to sabrina.nielebock at tuebingen.mpg.de 
.

The Max Planck Society is an equal opportunity employer and is  
committed to employing more handicapped individuals and especially  
encourages them to apply. The Max Planck Society wishes to increase  
the share of women in areas in which they are underrepresented. Women  
are strongly invited to apply.


From fabio.bonsignorio at heronrobots.com  Wed Oct 14 06:33:31 2009
From: fabio.bonsignorio at heronrobots.com (Fabio Bonsignorio)
Date: Wed, 14 Oct 2009 15:33:31 +0200
Subject: [robotics-worldwide] Online Program: IROS2009 Workshop on
	Performance Evaluation and Benchmarking for Next Intelligent
	Robots and Systems
Message-ID: <d02c0eb70910140633t27acacb0r7cc98971c6f69121@mail.gmail.com>

Dear all,
the call for participation and program for the
IROS Workshop on  Performance Evaluation and Benchmarking for Next
Intelligent Robots and Systems to be held in St. Louis on October 15th
during IROS 2009.
are online here:
http://www.heronrobots.com/EuronGEMSig/GEMSIGIROS09Program.html
Join the discussion and contribute your ideas!

All the best

Fabio, Angel and Raj

-
Fabio P. Bonsignorio

Ceo
Heron Robots s.r.l.
Via R.Ceccardi 1/18
I-16121 Genova
Italy
www.heronrobots.com

Professor
Banco de Santander Chair of Excellence in Robotics
Universidad Carlos III de Madrid
Edificio Agust?n de Betancourt, Despacho 1.3B01
Avda. Universidad, 30
28911 Legan?s
Spain
Sent from St Louis, MO, United States

From rad at eecs.harvard.edu  Wed Oct 14 17:11:32 2009
From: rad at eecs.harvard.edu (Radhika Nagpal)
Date: Wed, 14 Oct 2009 20:11:32 -0400
Subject: [robotics-worldwide] Harvard Postdoc position: Robobee Project
Message-ID: <CE0DF1FC-1D45-4CF7-B100-76147AC461F4@eecs.harvard.edu>


*** The RoboBee project: Colony algorithms and design ***

A team of researchers at Harvard, Northeastern, and Centeye, Inc. are
collaborating to create a coordinated colony of robotic bees:
'RoboBees'. Inspired by the biology of a bee and the insect?s hive
behavior, the researchers aim to push advances in miniature robotics
and the design of compact high-energy power sources; spur innovations
in ultra-low-power computing and electronic ?smart? sensors; and
refine coordination algorithms to manage multiple, independent
machines. Research topics are split between 'body', 'brain', and
'colony' and we have multiple postdoctoral research positions open in
these areas. A synopsis of the RoboBees project can be found on our
website (robobees.seas.harvard.edu).

One of the key areas of research is "colony" design: As with natural
bees, we expect that RoboBees will coordinate to perform tasks
collectively to be more effective and robust than individuals acting
independantly. The RoboBee project is seeking a postdoctoral
researcher to design colony level algorithms and develop a first-round
embedded testbed for testing wireless communication and sensing
aspects of the robots. Applicants should have a Ph.D. in computer
science or a related field. Experience with robotics is highly
preferred.

Applicants should send a cover letter briefly describing their
background and career plans, a CV, and the names and contact
information for at least three references. The positions are open
immediately (9/1/09) and are guaranteed for a year with a possible
second year extension. These documents should be submitted as pdf
attachments to Prof. Radhika Nagpal rad at eecs.harvard.edu.

Harvard University is an Equal Opportunity/Affirmative Action employer
and applications from women and underrepresented minorities are
strongly encouraged.




From jlpons at iai.csic.es  Thu Oct 15 07:28:53 2009
From: jlpons at iai.csic.es (=?iso-8859-1?Q?Jos=E9_L._Pons?=)
Date: Thu, 15 Oct 2009 16:28:53 +0200
Subject: [robotics-worldwide] Special Issue on Human-Robot
	Interface/Interaction in jAB&B
Message-ID: <FD456A77897A46A6AF3EBBB7AACD26D3@Gaia>


Dear Colleagues,

The following Special Issue is being organized in jAB&B. Please feel free to propose contributions or contact the Guest Editors for further information. Best regards.



  
(Apologies if you receive multiple copies)

APPLIED BIONICS AND BIOMECHANICS 

Announcement and Call for Papers - Special Issue

Human-Robot Interface / Interaction 

 

Contributions to the special issue of Applied Bionics and Biomechanics, on "Human-Robot Interface / Interaction" are welcome. The primary goal of this special issue is to collect state of the art contributions on the interfacing modalities between human and robots, and the physical and cognitive aspects resulting from the interaction between them. The issue will stress human-centered domains like rehabilitation, assistive robotics, and personal robotics.

 

The history of robotics is one of ever closer interaction with the human actor. The current scenario is one of transition from the industrial workplace towards increasing interaction with the human operator in other scenarios. This means that interaction with humans is expanding from a mere exchange of information (in teleoperation tasks) and service robotics to a close interaction involving physical and cognitive modalities. The concept of Wearable Robots (WRs), as person-oriented robots comprising prosthetic devices and exoskeletons, has emerged.

 

The symbiotic relationship between humans and robots transcends the boundaries of simple physical interaction. It involves smart sensors, actuators, algorithms and control strategies capable of gathering and decoding complex human expressions or physiological phenomena. Robots use the information to adapt, learn and optimize their functions, or even to transmit back a response resulting from a cognitive process occurring within the robot. It is in this context that interfacing modalities play a crucial role.

 

Specific topics include, but are not limited to:

 

?       Multimodal interfaces in human-robot systems

?       Brain-robot  interfaces

?       EMG as a source of information in human-robot interfacing

?       Human-robot interface based on IMUs

?       Invasive neural prosthesis for neural signal detection and nerve stimulation

?       Bio-inspiration and Bio-mimetism in Human-Robot Interfaces

?       Neuroimage technologies for enhancing BMI performance

?       New directions on EEG-based BMI systems

?       New directions on EMG control of upper-limb prostheses

?       EEG-EMG combined approach to interface a tremor suppression soft robot

?       Interfacing issues in neurobotics exoskeletons

?       Human-robot interface in walking aids

 

 

PUBLICATION SCHEDULE

 

?       Manuscript Submission Deadline: January 31, 2010 

 

 

INSTRUCTIONS FOR PROSPECTIVE AUTHORS

 

Prepare manuscripts according to the author instructions given in the Journal Web

 

Journal Home Web: http://www.tandf.co.uk/journals/titles/11762322.asp

Instructions for Authors: http://www.tandf.co.uk/journals/authors/tbobauth.asp

 

 

SPECIAL ISSUE GUEST EDITORS



Request of additional information and contributions will be sent to the Special-Issue Guest Editors: Jos? L. Pons, CSIC (Spanish National Research Council), jlpons at iai.csic.es; Luis J. Barrios, CSIC (Spanish National Research Council), lbarrios at iai.csic.es; and Jos? M. Azorin, Miguel Hernandez University, jm.azorin at umh.es.





Jos? L. Pons
Grupo de Bioingenier?a - Bioengineering Group
Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Cient?ficas
Ctra. Campo Real, km. 0,200
28500 Arganda del Rey, Madrid, Spain


Tel.: 0034 918711900
Fax.: 0034 918717050

From G.A.Kragten at tudelft.nl  Thu Oct 15 13:15:43 2009
From: G.A.Kragten at tudelft.nl (Gert Kragten - 3ME)
Date: Thu, 15 Oct 2009 22:15:43 +0200
Subject: [robotics-worldwide] announcement: International Workshop on
	Underactuated Grasping
Message-ID: <33BEFE849CEB1F488122B963ECFA9F21016165F9@SRV502.tudelft.net>

International Workshop on Underactuated Grasping
August 19, 2010 - Immediately after the ASME IDETC2010
Montreal
http://www.polymtl.ca/labrobot/workshop2010/


Call for papers: full paper (4-8 pages) submission deadline Feb 2010
 

ABOUT THE WORKSHOP:
This workshop intends to bring together the leading researchers and industrial innovators in safe and simple grasping technologies, in particular in underactuated grasping, in order to discuss promising research directions and strategies to meet the upcoming challenges. 

Interactive sessions and hardware demonstrations of grasping devices designed and developed by the attendees are going to make this workshop lively and in-depth.
 

WORKSHOP OBJECTIVES:
1. Overview of the state of the art in the field of underactuated grasping
2. Share lessons learnt
3. Identify avenues for the industrial application of underactuated robotic hands
4. Identify open issues in the theoretical framework and define new collaborative research questions
 

CALL FOR PAPERS:
We solicit papers (4-8 pages) on the following topics:
1. Papers discussing lessons learnt from the analysis, synthesis and application of underactuated hands
2. Papers discussing new hypotheses, ideas or concepts for new research directions
3. Papers on grasp performance definition, calculation and measurement
4. Papers on modeling or simulation of underactuated grasping
5. Any other topic matching the objectives of this workshop
 

IMPORTANT DATES:
Oct 2009   Call for papers
Feb 2010   Submission of papers
Apr 2010   Decision on papers
May 2010   Submission of revised papers
June 2010  Submission of other material (posters, videos)
Aug 2010   Workshop


WORKSHOP ORGANIZERS:
Lionel Birglen
?cole Polytechnique, Montr?al
Lionel.Birglen at polymtl.ca

Gert A. Kragten
Delft University of Technology
G.A.Kragten at tudelft.nl


PROGRAM/ SCIENTIFIC COMMITTEE:
Samuel Bouchard, Canada
Marco Ceccarelli, Italy
Richard Crowder, UK
Jian Dai, UK
Michael Goldfarb, USA
Clement Gosselin, Canada
Just Herder, The Netherlands
Shigeo Hirose, Japan
Sebastien Krut, France
Vijay Kumar, USA
Thierry Lalibert?, Canada
Gabriele Vassura, Italy
Ian Walker, USA
Rich Walker, UK
Wen-zeng Zhang, China
Matteo Zoppi, Italy

Please refer to the corresponding website http://www.polymtl.ca/labrobot/workshop2010/ for detailed information.



---------------------------------------------
Gert A. Kragten, PhD-student
 
Delft University of Technology
Faculty of Mechanical, Maritime and Materials Engineering
Department of BioMechanical Engineering
 
Mekelweg 2
2628 CD  Delft
The Netherlands
 
V: +31 15 278 5633
 

From ravinder.dahiya at iit.it  Fri Oct 16 06:25:05 2009
From: ravinder.dahiya at iit.it (Ravinder Dahiya)
Date: Fri, 16 Oct 2009 15:25:05 +0200
Subject: [robotics-worldwide] Workshop on Tactile Sensing @ Humanoids 2009 -
	Deadline Extended
Message-ID: <007e01ca4e64$12c35dd0$384a1970$@dahiya@iit.it>

Dear colleagues,

Apologies for duplicate messages.

The submission deadline for the workshop on "Tactile Sensing in Humanoids -
Tactile Sensors and Beyond" has been extended. New deadline is 30 October
2009. 

----------------------------------------------------------------------------
-------------------------------------
"Tactile Sensing in Humanoids - Tactile Sensors and Beyond" Workshop,
December 7, Paris, France.

http://eris.liralab.it/wiki/Tactile_sensing_workshop_%40_Humanoids_%2709


The 9th IEEE-RAS International Conference on Humanoid Robots (Humanoids09),
December 7-10, 2009, Paris, France. 

http://humanoids2009.org/
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
-------------------------------------

# Aim and Scope of the Workshop: 

This workshop will be a forum to discuss issues related with the development
of not only the tactile/touch sensors but also their integration on robots
and hence the "effective utilization" of tactile information. The workshop
aims to bring together researchers from different areas such as robotics,
sensors, large area electronics, and human sense of touch etc. to discuss: 

1.The issues that have been hindering the effective usage of tactile sensing
in robotics and the solutions to clear such hindering blocks. 
2.The studies (e.g. studies on human sense of touch) or technological
advances (e.g. large area flexible electronics) that can help in solving
some of the issues related to effective utilization of tactile sensing. 

The discussion/topics of interest include (but not limited to): 

- The innovations in tactile sensing technology for high density areas like
fingertips. 
- Various skin technologies for covering large areas of robot's body. 
- Issues related to integration of sensors/sensor arrays/skin with the
robot's body. 
- Innovations in intrinsic and extrinsic tactile sensing. 
- Human/biological inspired sense of touch for robotics. 
- Studies on human sense of touch that can help improve the robotic touch
sensing system. 
- Simulation/modeling the touch sensing with/without other sense modalities.

- Multimodal interaction systems involving sense of touch. 
- Hardware for haptic/tactile interaction. 
- Modeling dynamics of deformable and soft objects for haptic/tactile
feedback. 
- Perception of materials using tactile feedback. 
- Experiments on robots utilizing tactile information. 
- Humanoid/Robotic platforms that include tactile sensing.
 
The full day workshop is intended to attract the audience from areas like
tactile sensing, haptics, muti-modal sensing, microsystems, electronics,
human sense of touch and robotics.

# Abstract Submission Guidelines: 

Contributors are requested to submit a 2 page abstract outlining their
past/new work. The accepted abstracts will be presented as lecture/posters
at the workshop and be published as part of the workshop proceedings. A
special issue is planned after the workshop. The contributions must be sent
by email to ravinder.dahiya at iit.it or Ravinder.Dahiya at unige.it 


# Important Dates: 

Initial Abstract Submission - 30 October, 2009. 
Paper Acceptance decision - 16 November, 2009. 
Final Manuscript Submission - 27 November, 2009. 
Workshop Day - 7 December, 2009.

# Organizers: 

- Ravinder Dahiya, Italian Institute of Technology, Genoa, Italy. 
- Giorgio Metta, Italian Institute of Technology, Genoa, Italy. 
- Maurizio Valle, DIBE, University of Genoa, Italy. 
- Giorgio Cannata, DIST, University of Genoa, Italy. 

For more information, please visit the following website:
http://eris.liralab.it/wiki/Tactile_sensing_workshop_%40_Humanoids_%2709


Sincerely,



Ravinder S. Dahiya, PhD
Post-Doc Researcher,
Robotics, Brain and Cognitive Sciences Department,
Italian Institute of Technology,
Via Morego 30, Genova, 16163, Italy
Phone: +39-010-71781465
Fax: +39-010-7170817




From kmombaur at laas.fr  Fri Oct 16 06:51:34 2009
From: kmombaur at laas.fr (Katja Mombaur)
Date: Fri, 16 Oct 2009 15:51:34 +0200
Subject: [robotics-worldwide] IEEE Humanoids Workshop "Modeling,
 Simulation and Optimization of Bipedal Walking"
Message-ID: <4AD87A66.9040201@laas.fr>

***************************************************************************** 

*
*                Call for Participation & Posters
*
*                 for  IEEE Humanoids 2009 Workshop
*
*    Modeling, Simulation and Optimization of Bipedal Walking
*
*                 December 7, 2009, Paris, France
*
***************************************************************************** 


Overview:
---------
The model-based investigation of motions of anthropomorphic systems is an
important interdisciplinary research topic involving specialists from 
many fields
such as Robotics, Biomechanics, Physiology, Orthopedics, Psychology, 
Neurosciences,
Robotics, Sport , Computer Graphics and Applied Mathematics. In this 
context,
the study of basic locomotion forms such as walking and running is of 
particular
interest due to the high demand on dynamic coordination, actuator 
efficiency and
balance control. Mathematical models and numerical simulation and 
optimization
techniques, in combination with experimental data, can help to better 
understand
the basic underlying mechanisms of  these motions and to improve them.
The goal of this full-day workshop is to gather specialists of the 
related fields to present
the state of the art of model-based bipedal walking research at IEEE 
Humanoids 2009.

Example topics of this workshop are:
  * Modeling techniques for anthropomorphic bipedal walking systems
  * Optimized walking motions for different objective functions
  * Simulation and optimization approaches for humanoid robots
  * Biologically inspired control algorithms for bipedal walking
  * Generation and deformation of natural walking in computer graphics
  * Imitation of human motions on humanoids
  * Application of walking simulations in orthopedics
  * Simulation of biologically inspired actuators for bipedal walking
    machines
  * Modeling and simulation techniques for the development of new
    ortheses and  prostheses


Confirmed Speakers:
-------------------

  * Chris Atkeson, CMU, Pittsburgh, USA:
    Dynamic programming approaches to humanoid behavior optimization
  * Christine Azevedo,  LIRMM, Montpellier, France:
    Coupling CPG-based trajectory generation and optimal control to
    control online bipedal walking
  * Karsten Berns, TU Kaiserslautern, Germany :
    Modelling and Control of Dynamic Walking Bipedal Robots **
  * Philippe Bidaud, ISIR, UPMC, Paris:
    LQP-based controller design for iCub whole-body motion
  * Hartmut Geyer, MIT, Cambridge, USA:
    A model of biped walking based on muscle reflexes that encode
    principles of legged mechanics.
  * Hideki Kadone, LPPA, Paris, France:
    Kinematic cues underlying the expression and perception of
    emotions during human gait
  * Thilo Kerscher, FZI, Karlsruhe, Germany:
    Elastic actuation for biped walking using fluidic muscles
  * Dirk Lefeber, FU Brussels, Belgium:
    Use of compliant actuators in prosthetic foot designs
  * Sigrid Leyendecker*, TU Kaiserslautern, Germany
    Structure preserving optimal control of three-dimensional compass gait
  * Katja Mombaur, LAAS-CNRS, Toulouse, France :
    Forward and Inverse Optimal Control of Bipedal Walking
  * Julien Pettre, INRIA-IRISA, Rennes, France :
    Motion-capture based locomotion synthesis for digital actors
  * Andre Seyfarth,  University of Jena, Germany:
    Walking and running: how leg compliance shapes the way we move
  * Wael Suleiman, AIST, Tsukuba, Japan:
    Optimization and Imitation Problems for Humanoid Robots
  * Heiko Wagner, Univ. M?nster, Germany:
    Motor Control and Spinal Pattern Generators in Humans
  * Katsu Yamane, Disney Research, Pittsburgh, USA :
    Dynamics, Geometry and Biomechanics for Locomotion Synthesis and
    Control
  * Bum-Jae You, KIST, Seoul, Korea :
    Whole body motion control framework for arbitrarily and simultaneously
    assigned upper-body tasks and walking motion


Call for posters:
-----------------

There will be a small poster session in this workshop. If you wish to 
present a poster,
please submit a 1-page abstract by email  to both organizers (see below) 
using the
template available at the web page 
http://humanoids2009.org/program/workshops -> Workshop 5.

Deadline for submission: November 5, 2009
Notification of Acceptance: November 10, 2009


Registration:
-------------

Registration for the workshop can soon be made via the IEEE Humanoids 
2009 web page
http://humanoids2009.org/  along  with your registration for the 
conference.


Organizers:
-----------

Katja Mombaur, LAAS-CNRS, Toulouse, France, kmombaur at laas.fr
Karsten Berns, TU Kaiserslautern, Germany, berns at informatik.uni-kl.de


From tom.ziemke at his.se  Fri Oct 16 08:12:34 2009
From: tom.ziemke at his.se (Tom Ziemke)
Date: Fri, 16 Oct 2009 17:12:34 +0200
Subject: [robotics-worldwide] PhD student positions in cognitive/affective
	robotics
Message-ID: <4AD88D62.3010203@his.se>


Two PhD student positions in cognitive/affective robotics
are available in the Cognition & Interaction Lab, University
of Skovde, Sweden, as part of a recently started, EU-funded
four-year project called ROBOT-DOC, a Marie Curie Initial
Training Network, i.e. a multi-national doctoral training
network focused on developmental cognitive robotics.

More details about ROBOT-DOC can be found at:

	http://www.tech.plym.ac.uk/socce/robotdoc/index.html

More details about the positions in Skovde, and how to apply:

	http://www.his.se/coin (under "Job Openings")

The application deadline is October 26, 2009. Informal
enquiries can be directed to tom.ziemke at his.se.





From chiestand at salk.edu  Fri Oct 16 18:24:24 2009
From: chiestand at salk.edu (Chris Hiestand)
Date: Fri, 16 Oct 2009 18:24:24 -0700
Subject: [robotics-worldwide] Registration for the 2009 Neural Information
	Processing Systems Conference Is Open
Message-ID: <0EE7E2C0-AC8C-4173-B48F-292088C72337@salk.edu>

Registration:
https://nips.cc/Register/

Conference Program:
http://nips.cc/Conferences/2009/Program/

The last day for early registration pricing is November 6, 2009.

Tutorials: December 7, 2009 in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada
Main Conference: December 7 - 10, 2009 in Vancouver, British Columbia,  
Canada
Workshops: December 11-12, 2009 in Whistler, British Columbia, Canada

The tutorials will offer a choice of six two-hour tutorials by leading  
scientists. The topics span a wide range of subjects including  
Neuroscience, Learning Algorithms and Theory, Bioinformatics, Image  
Processing, and Data Mining.

The NIPS Conference features a single track program, with  
contributions from a large number of intellectual communities.  
Presentation topics include: Algorithms and Architectures;  
Applications; Brain Imaging; Cognitive Science and Artificial  
Intelligence; Control and Reinforcement Learning; Emerging  
Technologies; Learning Theory; Neuroscience; Speech and Signal  
Processing; and Visual Processing.  All papers are rigorously reviewed.

The Poster Sessions will take place Monday through Wednesday evenings,  
December 7 ? 9, 2009, during the Conference.  The sessions offer high- 
quality posters and an opportunity for researchers to share their work  
and exchange ideas in a collegial setting.  The majority of  
contributions accepted at NIPS are presented as posters.

The Demonstrations enable researchers to highlight scientific  
advances, systems, and technologies in ways that go beyond  
conventional poster presentations. It provides a unique forum for  
demonstrating advanced technologies ? both hardware and software ? and  
fostering the direct exchange of knowledge.

Following the regular program of the Neural Information Processing  
Systems 2009 conference in Vancouver, BC, Canada, four mini-symposia  
will be held in parallel during the afternoon of Thursday, December  
10, 2009, in the Hyatt Regency, Vancouver, BC, Canada.

The Post-Conference Workshop Program takes place in Whistler, B.C. at  
the Westin Resort and Spa and the Hilton Whistler Resort and Spa  
Friday, December 11 and Saturday, December 12, 2009. There will be 28  
workshops covering a wide range of topics from Neuroscience to Machine  
Learning.  The workshop program schedule allows time for informal  
discussions, skiing and other winter sports.

http://nips.cc

From robert.webster at vanderbilt.edu  Sat Oct 17 15:43:27 2009
From: robert.webster at vanderbilt.edu (Robert J. Webster, III)
Date: Sat, 17 Oct 2009 17:43:27 -0500
Subject: [robotics-worldwide] Faculty position(s) in Robotics/Design/Control
	at Vanderbilt
Message-ID: <4ADA488F.2070601@vanderbilt.edu>

Dear Colleagues,

We in the Mechanical Engineering Department at Vanderbilt are interested 
in hiring 1-2 faculty in the Robotics/Design/Control areas. We would 
like to move as rapidly as possible with the search, so please encourage 
all qualified candidates you are aware of to apply as soon as they are 
able. We are also serious about considering applications at all levels.

Our official job posting is included below.

The Department of Mechanical Engineering at Vanderbilt University 
invites applications for one or more faculty positions to begin Fall 
2010. Applications will be considered for positions at all ranks 
commensurate with qualifications. Applicants must possess a Ph.D. in 
Mechanical Engineering or closely related discipline and have expertise 
and research interests that are synergistic with existing research areas 
in the department including energy conversion, combustion, 
microfluidics, bioMEMS, nanotechnology, mechatronics, portable power, 
and robotics. Successful candidates will be expected to build a strong, 
externally-funded research program and make a significant contribution 
to the department?s research activities. The candidate should also have 
a marked interest in and talent for teaching in both the undergraduate 
(B.E.) and graduate (M.S. and Ph.D.) programs. The Department of 
Mechanical Engineering has a student body of about 265 undergraduates 
and 40 Ph.D. students. Applications consisting of a cover letter, a 
complete curriculum vitae, statements of teaching and research 
interests, and the addresses of four references (include email address) 
should be sent to Professor Robert W. Pitz, Chair, Search Committee, 
Department of Mechanical Engineering, Vanderbilt University, Box 1592, 
Station B, Nashville, TN 37235-1592, or sent electronically to: 
robert.w.pitz at vanderbilt.edu. Vanderbilt University is an Affirmative 
Action/Equal Opportunity Employer. Women and minorities are encouraged 
to apply.

From giovanni.indiveri at unisalento.it  Thu Oct 15 14:12:44 2009
From: giovanni.indiveri at unisalento.it (Giovanni Indiveri)
Date: Thu, 15 Oct 2009 23:12:44 +0200
Subject: [robotics-worldwide] CfP IFAC IAV2010
Message-ID: <4AD7904C.5040800@unisalento.it>


Apologies for multiple postings
-------------------------------


The IFAC 7th Symposium on Intelligent Autonomous Vehicles IAV 2010 is
approaching. Please find below the Call for Papers.

IMPORTANT DATA IN SHORT:

IFAC 7th Symposium on Intelligent Autonomous Vehicles IAV 2010,
September 6-8, 2010, Lecce, Italy.
http://iav2010.unile.it/

Paper submission is open from the Symposium website
http://iav2010.unile.it/.

Important Dates:
Submission of Draft Paper:     14 December 2009
Notification of Acceptance:     1 March 2010
Submission of Final Paper:     12 April 2010

Proposals for Invited Sessions are welcome and should be sent by email
to the IPC-chairs by November 16th 2009. More detailed instructions are
given below.

The proceedings of the Symposium will be published on-line on the
http://www.ifac-papersonline.net website.

Kind regards,

Antonio Pascoal and Giovanni Indiveri
IPC co-chairs


     http://iav2010.unile.it/

Call for Papers
IFAC 7th Symposium on Intelligent Autonomous Vehicles IAV 2010
September 6-8, 2010, Lecce, Italy

The Symposium will consider generic methodologies and techniques
applicable to intelligent autonomous vehicles. These include mobile
robots on land, at sea, in air or in space, multi vehicle systems, and
networks of autonomous vehicles. It will address sensing, sensor
integration and perception, architectures, planning, mission and motion
control, navigation and cooperative navigation techniques, SLAM,
teleoperation, human and vehicle interaction, and practical
applications. The focus of the Symposium will span from intelligent
vehicle control to auxiliary systems support. The Symposium will afford
participants a rare opportunity to attend lectures and paper
presentations and to engage in discussions on topics  pertaining to
autonomous intelligent vehicles in general. As such, it departs from
other events that focus on specific kinds of vehicles. This in turn will
foster the cross-fertilization of ideas among different application
areas. Key topics will include (but not be limited to):

# Architectures for intelligent autonomous systems including teams of
autonomous vehicles;

# Control, Guidance, and Navigation of autonomous robots (indoors,
outdoors, land, air, space, marine): modeling and control, trajectory
tracking and path following, navigation systems, planning, recognition,
localization, map building, SLAM;

# Sensors and sensor integration in autonomous robots;

# Intelligent transportation systems;

# Service robotics, domestic robotics, rehabilitation and biomedical
robotics, field robotics, entertainment robotics, ocean exploration robots;

# Redundant robots;

# Multiple Vehicle Systems and Networks of Autonomous Vehicles:
cooperative navigation and control of homogeneous and heterogeneous
teams, cooperative control under severe communication constraints,
cooperative perception, communications.

Submission of Draft Paper:     14 December 2009
Notification of Acceptance:     1 March 2010
Submission of Final Paper:     12 April 2010

Invited Session Proposals (one to two pages long) should be sent by
email to the IPC chairs by the 9th of November 2009. Each proposal
should specify: session title, outline, scope, organizers affiliation,
postal, and email address. The proposal should include a list of
candidate papers (4 to 6) to be hosted with abstract, authors' names,
affiliations, addresses, and e-mail addresses of the corresponding
authors. The Invited Session proposals will be evaluated by the IPC.
Invited Session papers will be peer reviewed and handled as regular
submissions.

At least one author (full registration) for each paper will be requested
to register for the Symposium.

SPONSORS
IFAC Technical Committee 7.5 on Intelligent Autonomous Vehicles (IAV)

Co-Sponsored by:
IFAC Technical Committee TC 1.3 - Discrete Event and Hybrid Systems
IFAC Technical Committee TC 4.1 - Components and Technologies for Control
IFAC Technical Committee TC 4.3 ? Robotics
IFAC Technical Committee TC 7.1 - Automotive Control
IFAC Technical Committee TC 7.2 - Marine Systems
IFAC Technical Committee TC 7.3 ? Aerospace

Technically Co-Sponsored by:
IEEE RAS - Robotics and Automation Society

IPC-Chairs
Antonio M. Pascoal, Instituto Superior T?cnico (IST), Lisbon, Portugal
and
Giovanni Indiveri, DII - Dipartimento Ing. Innovazione, University of
Salento, Lecce, Italy

For a list of IPC members, NOC members, submission details and further
information please refer to the Symposium Web Page http://iav2010.unile.it/


COPYRIGHT CONDITIONS The material submitted for presentation at an IFAC
meeting (Congress, Symposium, Conference, Workshop) must be original,
not published or being considered elsewhere. All papers accepted for
presentation will appear in the Preprints of the meeting and will be
distributed to the participants. Papers duly presented at the IFAC
Congress, Symposia, Conferences and Workshops will be hosted on-line on
the IFAC- PapersOnLine.net website. The presented papers will be further
screened for possible publication in the IFAC Journals (Automatica,
Control Engineering Practice, Annual Reviews in Control, Journal of
Process Control , Engineering Applications of Artificial Intelligence,
and Mechatronics), or in IFAC affiliated journals. All papers presented
will be recorded as an IFAC Publication. Copyright of material presented
at an IFAC meeting is held by IFAC. Authors will be required to transfer
copyrights electronically. The IFAC Journals and, after these, IFAC
affiliated journals have priority access to all contributions presented.
However, if the author is not contacted by an editor of these journals,
within three months after the meeting, he/she is free to submit an
expanded version of the presented material for journal publication
elsewhere. In this case, the paper must carry a reference to the IFAC
meeting where it was originally presented and, if the paper has appeared
on the website www.IFAC-PapersOnLine.net, also a reference to this
publication.


-- 
IFAC Intelligent Autonomous Vehicles 2010 Symposium
6-8 September 2010 - Universit? del Salento - Lecce
Italy
http://iav2010.unile.it


From asada at MIT.EDU  Mon Oct 19 21:16:03 2009
From: asada at MIT.EDU (Harry H. Asada)
Date: Tue, 20 Oct 2009 00:16:03 -0400
Subject: [robotics-worldwide] IJRR Special Issue
Message-ID: <4ADD3983.8040208@mit.edu>

****************************Call for Papers******************************

                                    International Journal of Robotics 
Research

                                                        Special Issue on

                                 Stochasticity in Robotics and 
Biological Systems
**********************************************************************

Should you be interested in submitting a paper, please forward this 
e-mail to asada at mit.edu.

Guest Editors:  H. Harry Asada (M.I.T.) and Vijay Kumar (University of 
Pennsylvania)

Important Dates:

        November 30, 2009                 Paper submission
        April 30, 2010                         Completion of First Review
        June 15, 2010                          Submission of Revised Papers
        August 16, 2010                      Completion of Final Review
        September 4, 2010                   Submission of Final 
Manuscripts and Source Files
        Late 2010/Early 2011              Publication


 


From cira2009 at jcinter.co.kr  Sun Oct 18 22:39:09 2009
From: cira2009 at jcinter.co.kr (CIRA2009)
Date: Mon, 19 Oct 2009 14:39:09 +0900
Subject: [robotics-worldwide] CIRA2009: Call for Participations
Message-ID: <200910190539.n9J5dBR24888@usc.edu>

2009 IEEE International Symposium on
Computational Intelligence in Robotics and Automation (CIRA2009)
DCC, Daejeon, Korea / December 15 - 18, 2009
http://www.cira2009.org 
Sponsored by the IEEE Robotics and Automation Society
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
Welcome to the CIRA2009
The IEEE International Symposium on Computational Intelligence in Robotics
and Automation (CIRA2009) will be held at DCC (Daejeon Convention Center) in
Daejeon, Korea, from December 15 through December 18, 2009. CIRA2009 will
provide an opportunity for prominent researchers, engineers and
practitioners to present the latest research results, innovations, and
potential future directions in computational intelligence in robotics and
automation.

Daejeon, where longstanding tradition and future science co-exist, was
reborn as a convention city of new concept. It is a clean and modern city
with excellent transportation system, state-of-the-art convention
facilities, various tourist attractions and accommodations. The biggest
strength of Daejeon as a MICE site is that it is the hub of Korea?s science
and technology industries.

Advance registration is available now on the website (www.cira2009.org) now.

Plenary Lectures
1. Using Evidence and Theory to Design More Effective Evolutionary
Algorithms (David B. Fogel, President, the IEEE Computational Intelligence
Society)
2. Cognitive Robotics: State of the Art and Challenges (Fakhri Karray,
University of Waterloo, Canada)
3. Social Robots for Personal Care (Shuzhi Sam Ge, IEEE Fellow, National
University of Singapore, Singapore)

Tutorials
There will be 2 tutorials?on Tuesday, December 15, 2009. You can find more
information?at the website soon.
1. Linking Cognitive Robotics and Brain Research (Dae-Shik Kim, Korea
Advanced Institute of Science and Technology, Korea)
2. Sensors and Robots for Humanitarian Demining: Needs, Present and Future
(Maki K. Habib, The American University in Cairo, Egypt)

Related Events
11th International Robot Olympiad 2009 Korea (December 17-20, 2009)
1st International Education Robot Fair 2009 (December 17-20, 2009)

General Chair: Jong-Hwan Kim (KAIST, Korea)
Program Chair: Sung-Bae Cho (Yonsei University, Korea)





From dieter.fox at intel.com  Mon Oct 19 21:40:33 2009
From: dieter.fox at intel.com (Fox, Dieter)
Date: Mon, 19 Oct 2009 21:40:33 -0700
Subject: [robotics-worldwide] Postdoc / researcher position in 3D vision and
 machine learning at Intel Labs Seattle
Message-ID: <B1BEEFEAD5527146A286141FBED9AE910C8062A001@orsmsx510.amr.corp.intel.com>

---------------------------------------------------

Postdoc / researcher position at Intel Labs Seattle

---------------------------------------------------



Intel Labs Seattle is a research lab with close ties to the University of

Washington. Research in the lab focuses on mobile robotics, computer vision,

human activity recognition, networking, human computer interaction, and wireless

power transfer.



With Dieter Fox as the new director of the lab, we are seeking to further expand

research in robotics and machine learning.  Specifically, we want to investigate

how depth cameras can be used to solve hard problems in robotic sensing and

manipulation. The newest generation of these cameras provides high resolution

RGB images along with per pixel depth information at high frame rates. The

combination of depth and color information opens up new challenges and opportunities

in various research areas, including robot manipulation, mapping, object recognition,

and human activity recognition.



In this context, we invite applications for a postdoc or researcher position in

the Intel Labs Seattle. We are specifically interested in applicants with a

strong background in 3D perception, computer vision, and machine learning.



Please email your curriculum vitae or resume to Seattle.Jobs at intel.com<mailto:Seattle.Jobs at intel.com>.



-----------------------------------------

Background on Intel Labs Seattle

-----------------------------------------



Founded in 2001, Intel Labs Seattle is one of three Intel "university labs",

the other two being at UC Berkeley and Carnegie Mellon University. Intel

Labs Seattle has roughly twenty permanent staff plus an equal number of

associated graduate and undergraduate students, interns, faculty and visitors.

The Seattle lab is broadly focused on future computing systems that are woven

into the fabric of everyday life - moving computing off the desktop and into

the real world. The research staff are recognized leaders across a range of

topics from sensing and wireless systems, through robotics and machine

learning, to computer vision and human-computer interaction.



As a "university lab", Intel Labs Seattle is based on an innovative model of

industry-university research that Intel has pioneered to enhance and accelerate

long-term research. Under this model, much research is conducted by Intel

researchers in collaboration with faculty and students all year round and is

openly published. The lab has close ties to the University of Washington: Intel

researchers are Affiliate Faculty or collaborators with Computer Science &

Engineering, Electrical Engineering, Public Health, Aero & Astro, Medicine, and

the iSchool. Further information on our projects and staff is available as an

overview brochure (http://seattle.intel-research.net/brochure2009.pdf) and

on the lab website (http://seattle.intel-research.net/).




From doetomo at unimelb.edu.au  Mon Oct 19 07:45:45 2009
From: doetomo at unimelb.edu.au (Denny Oetomo)
Date: Tue, 20 Oct 2009 01:45:45 +1100
Subject: [robotics-worldwide] CfP: Special Issue: Agricultural robotics,
 Springer Journal of Intelligent Service Robotics (JISR)
References: <4AD7904C.5040800@unisalento.it>
Message-ID: <CF1AE00FCCB41E47A0B81F51459C836D03C700C2@IS-EX-BEV1.unimelb.edu.au>

Springer Journal of Intelligent Service Robotics (JISR): Special Issue 
on Agricultural Robotics 


The vision of the emerging trend in autonomous farming is of great 
interest, not only to the robotics and agricultural communities, but 
also to the industries and wider community. The recent advances in the 
field of robotics and computer technologies have further improved our 
capabilities to automate the processes in the agricultural 
industries.  This is important not only to keep in pace with the 
increasing population growth rate, but also to improve the quality and 
effeciency of food production processes. 


We invite papers that exhibit theories and methods applied to field of 
agricultural robotics, especially in the high level intelligence to 
provide the robust and autonomous operation of agricultural / farming 
processes.  These could include (but not limited to): 
* Examples of novel and robust implementation of robotics technology 
deployed on the farm 
* Methods of sensing,identification, localisation, and task tracking 
in the semi-structured farming environment 
* Manipulation strategies specific to the tasks required in the 
agricultural processes 
* Techniques for reliable information sharing in an integrated farm 
automation framework 
* Strategies for effective human-machine coordination and cooperation 
in farming tasks 
* Algorithm for efficient interaction between the systems and the 
environment 
* Other novel ideas, concepts, applications that would be of 
significant contribution to the field of agricultural automation 


Website for the Springer Journal of Intelligent Service Robotics: 
http://www.springer.com/engineering/robotics/journal/11370 


The instructions for author and the site for online paper submission 
can be found in: 
http://www.editorialmanager.com/isr/ 


Special Issue Guest Editors: 
John Billingsley, University of Southern Queensland 
John Reid, Intelligent Machine Systems, John Deere 
Denny Oetomo, University of Melbourne 


Important dates: 
February 1, 2010    - Submission of manuscripts 
May 3, 2010          - Completion of review process 
May 17, 2010        - Notification of acceptance 
June 14, 2010        - Final manuscripts due for publication 
Oct  2010              - Issue publication 


Contacts: 
John Billingsley: John.Billingsley at usq.edu.au
John Reid: ReidJohnF at JohnDeere.com
Denny Oetomo: doetomo at unimelb.edu.au 



 
----------------------------------------------
Denny Oetomo PhD
Lecturer
Department of Mechanical Engineering
The University of Melbourne
VIC 3010 Australia
Phone: +61 3 8344 6795
Fax:     +61 3 9347 8784
Email:  doetomo(at) unimelb.edu.au
 
 

From enric.cervera at icc.uji.es  Tue Oct 20 01:27:34 2009
From: enric.cervera at icc.uji.es (Enric Cervera)
Date: Tue, 20 Oct 2009 10:27:34 +0200
Subject: [robotics-worldwide] IARP Workshop RISE 2010 - Deadline Extension -
	Oct 25
Message-ID: <7DFEE00B-FD40-427F-9235-E54A4B4D4753@icc.uji.es>

Apologies for multiple postings.

IARP Workshop on
?Robots for Risky Interventions
and Environmental  Surveillance-Maintenance?

January 2010, 20-21, Sheffield, UK

The general objective of the International Advanced Robotics
Programme (IARP)  is to encourage development of advanced
robotic systems that can dispense with human work for
difficult activities in harsh, demanding or dangerous
environments, and to contribute to the revitalization and
growth of the world economy.

Through this fourth  workshop, the IARP working group RISE
(Risky Intervention and Surveillance /Maintenance of the
Environment) and the the European partners of the
FW6/FW7-IST projects(a.o.  View-Finder (aiming the
assistance of fire-fighting/protection services) and Guardians
(aiming the use of swarm of robots for Rescue assistance)
organise dedicated sessions on next topics:

- Inspection of fire or crisis grounds
- CBRN-E  threats
- Map building and reconstruction
- Networked crisis management tools
- Human-Machine Interfaces
- Remote controlled, semi-autonomous, autonomous robot navigation
- Multi-robot cooperation
- Swarm of robots
- Crisis Management tools

An abstract (approximately 300 words in English)
should be received not later than October 25,
2009. Electronic submissions of the abstracts
(Word , PS-format, PDF-files) should be mailed to:

rise2010 at shu.ac.uk

- Paper proposal deadline:    October 25
- Final selection and invitation of participants:    November 1
- Receipt of full-papers:         November 13

Workshop inquiries to:

Workshop ?Risky Interventions and
Environmental Surveillance RISE 2010

Jacques Penders
MERI, Sheffield Hallam University, Howard
Street, Sheffield, UK
rise2010 at shu.ac.uk



From gaurav at usc.edu  Mon Oct 19 12:28:43 2009
From: gaurav at usc.edu (Gaurav S. Sukhatme)
Date: Mon, 19 Oct 2009 12:28:43 -0700
Subject: [robotics-worldwide] Autonomous Robots 27(3) TOC
Message-ID: <562c8ffd0910191228y3859d1c8h76b3daba43099e6c@mail.gmail.com>

Volume 27 Number 3 of Autonomous Robots is now available at the
SpringerLink website (http://springerlink.com/content/100243/).
SpringerLink allows free access to all paper abstracts. Full access
(PDF) is by individual or institutional subscription.

In addition to regular papers, this issue contains a special section
titled 'Visual Guidance Systems for Small Unmanned Aerial
Vehicles'. Thanks to the guest editors St?phane Viollet and Franck
Ruffier for their work in putting this section together.

-------------------------------------------------------------------
Autonomous Robots 27(3) Table of Contents
-------------------------------------------------------------------

Guest editorial: Visual guidance systems for small Unmanned Aerial
Vehicles
Author(s): St?phane Viollet, Franck Ruffier
DOI: 10.1007/s10514-009-9128-9
pp. 145 - 146

Online world modeling and path planning for an unmanned helicopter
Author(s): Franz Andert, Florian Adolf
DOI: 10.1007/s10514-009-9134-y
pp. 147 - 164

An adaptive vision-based autopilot for mini flying machines guidance,
navigation and control
Author(s): Farid Kendoul, Kenzo Nonami, Isabelle Fantoni, Rogelio Lozano
DOI: 10.1007/s10514-009-9135-x
pp. 165 - 188

Implementation of wide-field integration of optic flow for autonomous
quadrotor navigation
Author(s): Joseph Conroy, Gregory Gremillion, Badri Ranganathan,
J. Sean Humbert
DOI: 10.1007/s10514-009-9140-0
pp. 189 - 198

Erratum to: Implementation of wide-field integration of optic flow for
autonomous quadrotor navigation
Author(s): Joseph Conroy, Gregory Gremillion, Badri Ranganathan,
J. Sean Humbert
DOI: 10.1007/s10514-009-9154-7
pp. 199 - 200

Vision-based control of near-obstacle flight
Author(s): Antoine Beyeler, Jean-Christophe Zufferey, Dario Floreano
DOI: 10.1007/s10514-009-9139-6
pp. 201 - 219

Regular papers

Discovery of sound sources by an autonomous mobile robot
Author(s): Eric Martinson, Alan Schultz
DOI: 10.1007/s10514-009-9123-1
pp. 221 - 237

Optima localization by vehicle formations imitating the Nelder-Mead
simplex algorithm
Author(s): Shahab Kalantar, Uwe R. Zimmer
DOI: 10.1007/s10514-009-9124-0
pp. 239 - 260

A methodology for design and analysis of cooperative behaviors with
mobile robots
Author(s): Ashish D. Deshpande, Jonathan E. Luntz
DOI: 10.1007/s10514-009-9125-z
pp. 261 - 276

A framework for the control of stable aperiodic walking in
underactuated planar bipeds
Author(s): T. Yang, E. R. Westervelt, A. Serrani, J. P. Schmiedeler
DOI: 10.1007/s10514-009-9126-y
pp. 277 - 290

A biomimetic, force-field based computational model for motion
planning and bimanual coordination in humanoid robots
Author(s): V. Mohan, P. Morasso, G. Metta, G. Sandini
DOI: 10.1007/s10514-009-9127-x
pp. 291 - 307

-------------------------------------------------------------------
Gaurav S. Sukhatme
Editor-in-Chief
Autonomous Robots
http://robotics.usc.edu/~gaurav

From jsabater at iiia.csic.es  Mon Oct 19 01:50:35 2009
From: jsabater at iiia.csic.es (Jordi Sabater-Mir)
Date: Mon, 19 Oct 2009 10:50:35 +0200
Subject: [robotics-worldwide] [AAMAS-2010] - Final call for workshops
	proposal
Message-ID: <4ADC285B.9070201@iiia.csic.es>

     (apologies for multiple postings)


-------------------------------------------------------------------------
AAMAS 2010 - Call for Workshop Proposals
-------------------------------------------------------------------------

----
The AAMAS-2010 conference has a special track on Robotics. Workshops on  
robotics,
particularly with a focus on autonomous robots and multi-robot 
coordination are therefore
encouraged.
----

The AAMAS-2010 Organizing Committee invites proposals for the Workshop
Program to be held on May 10-11, 2010  immediately prior to the main 
technical
program of the AAMAS conference.

The main goal of the AAMAS-2010 workshops is to stimulate and facilitate 
discussion,
interaction, and comparison of approaches, methods, and ideas related to 
specific
topics, both theoretical and applied, in the general area of Autonomous 
Agents and
Multiagent Systems. The AAMAS-2010 workshops will provide an informal 
setting where
participants will have the opportunity to discuss specific technical 
topics in an atmosphere
that fosters the active exchange of ideas. AAMAS 2010 will be co-located 
with KR,
NMR, ICAPS, FOIS, (all in Toronto) and DL 2010 (in Waterloo, Ontario, 
Canada),
and welcomes proposals that cater to the broader community across these 
areas.

Members from all areas of the AAMAS community are invited to submit 
workshop
proposals for review. Workshops on new and emerging topics, 
applications, and on
broader topics catering to the broader community represented by the 
co-located
events are particularly encouraged. Workshops can vary in length, but 
most will
be one full day in duration. Workshop organizers and attendees must 
register
for their workshop and preferably also for the  main AAMAS conference. 
Attendance
is limited to registered participants only.

--------------------------------------------------------
Important Dates for Workshops
--------------------------------------------------------

  OCTOBER 31, 2009 - Proposal Submission Deadline
  NOVEMBER 30, 2009 - Acceptance Notification
  DECEMBER 11, 2009 - Deadline for posting Workshops Call for Papers
  DECEMBER 11, 2009 - AAMAS-2010 Workshops Program Announced
  FEBRUARY,  2, 2010 - Submission of contributions to workshops
  MARCH 2, 2010 - Workshop paper acceptance notification
  MARCH 19, 2010 - Deadline for complete workshop notes submission to 
the workshop chair

Workshop chair

  MARCH 19, 2010 - Deadline for posting a Call for Participation
  MAY 10-11, 2010 - AAMAS-2010 WORKSHOPS

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
AAMAS-2010 Workshops Requirements for Submission
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Proposals for workshops should be a maximum of five pages in length (in 
plain
ASCII text), and should contain the following information:

- Title of the workshop.

- A technical description of the workshop, specifying the workshop 
goals, the
technical issues that it will address,  and the relevance of the 
workshop to
the main conference.

- A discussion of why and to whom the workshop is of interest.

- A list of related workshops held within the last three years, if any, 
and their
relation to the proposed workshop.  Information about previous offerings 
of the
proposed workshop: when and where it has been offered in the past  
(i.e., with AAMAS
or another conference?), organizers names and affiliations, number of 
submissions, 
acceptances and registered attendees, and follow-up publications, if 
any  (e.g., journal
special issue).

- A preliminary workshop agenda and a proposed schedule for organizing 
the workshop.
This should include a brief description of how the organizers intend to 
encourage an
atmosphere appropriate for a workshop.

- Description of paper review process and acceptance standards.

- If available, a list of tentatively confirmed attendees.

- The names, affiliations, postal addresses, phone numbers, and email 
addresses of the
proposed workshop  organizing committee. This committee should consist 
of three or four
people knowledgeable about the technical issues to be addressed. The 
organizing committee
should include individuals from multiple institutions.

-The name of the primary contact for the organizing committee (this 
person must have an
email address).

- A description of the qualifications of the individual committee 
members with respect to
organizing an AAMAS  workshop, including a list of workshops previously 
arranged by any
members of the proposed organizing committee, if any.

- List of potential program committee members, including their title and 
affiliations.

- Expected duration of the workshop (half or full day).

- A list of places (distribution lists, web sites, journals, etc.) where 
the workshop is
planned to be advertised.


All proposals should be submitted by electronic mail, in plain ASCII 
text, to the AAMAS-2010
Workshop Chair:

Kagan Tumer ( kagan.tumer at oregonstate.edu )

as soon as possible but no later than: Saturday October 31, 2009.

Prospective organizers will be notified of the committee's decision
no later than: Monday November 30, 2009.

The selection of the workshops to be included in the final AAMAS program 
will be based upon
multiple factors, including: the scientific/technical interest of the 
topics, the clarity of
the proposal in addressing the requested information, the 
innovativeness  of workshop topics,
the cross-disciplinary nature of the workshop, and the capacity of the 
conference workshop
program. Note that authors of proposals addressing similar and/or 
overlapping content areas
and/or audiences may be requested to merge their proposals.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Responsibilities of AAMAS and workshop organizers
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

For all accepted proposals, AAMAS will be responsible for:

- Providing publicity for the workshop series as a whole.

- Providing logistic support and a meeting place for the workshop.

- Together with the organizers, determining the workshop date and time.


Workshop organizers will be responsible for:

-Setting up a website for the workshop.

-Advertising the workshop and issuing a call for papers (by DECEMBER 
11,  2009) and
a call for participation (by MARCH 19, 2010).

-Collecting and evaluating submissions, notifying authors of acceptance 
or rejection
on a timely basis, and ensuring a transparent and fair selection 
process. All workshop
organizers commit themselves to adopt the same deadlines for paper 
submissions and
notifications of acceptance, i.e.,  FEBRUARY 2, 2010: Submissions of 
contributions
to workshops; MARCH 2, 2010: Notifications

- Making the PDF of the whole workshop notes available to the workshops 
chair by MARCH 19,
2010, as well as a list of audio-visual requirements and any special 
room requirements.
The AAMAS-2010 workshop notes will be included in the  flash drive 
containing the AAMAS-2010
conference proceedings. To that end, please include the following 
sentence in your call for
papers: "Workshop notes including all accepted papers will be 
distributed to AAMAS-2010
registrants in electronic form. Printed workshop notes will NOT be made 
available to workshop
participants."

- Ensuring that the workshop notes or individual papers are available 
from the workshops
websites, as appropriate. Though the workshop notes will appear on the 
flash drive distributed
to conference attendees, the workshop notes will not be hosted on the 
IFAAMAS website.

- Ensuring that the workshop organizers and the participants register 
for the workshop and
are invited to register  to the main conference (at least one author 
must register for the
workshop in order for a paper to appear in the  workshop proceedings).

AAMAS reserves the right to cancel any workshop if the above 
responsibilities are not fulfilled,
or if too few paying attendees register for the workshop to support its 
running costs.

----------------------------------------------
Submissions and Inquiries
----------------------------------------------

Please send proposals and inquiries to:

Kagan Tumer
Oregon State University
kagan.tumer at oregonstate.edu

 

 


From pal at isr.ist.utl.pt  Mon Oct 19 07:00:56 2009
From: pal at isr.ist.utl.pt (Pedro M. U. A. Lima)
Date: Mon, 19 Oct 2009 15:00:56 +0100
Subject: [robotics-worldwide] Call for Post-Doc Grant on Biology and Economy
	inspired robots
Message-ID: <4ADC7118.1030203@isr.ist.utl.pt>

[apologies for duplicates]

Post-Doctoral Grant


A Call for Post-Doctoral grants is open until November 16, 2009. We are 
looking for a candidate to become part of a multi-disciplinary group of 
researchers from two prestigious academic institutions in Lisbon, 
Portugal: Institute for Systems and Robotics and Instituto Gulbenkian de 
Ci?ncia. The post doctoral grant is funded by a new ambitious project in 
which we aim to construct mathematical models that bridge the gap and 
explore differences and similarities between bio-inspired (cell 
populations), robot swarms, and institutional economics inspired robot 
collectives.

The successful candidate will work on simulations and real experiments 
with cell populations and robot collectives. Multi-disciplinary 
backgrounds will be preferred, but candidates whose expertise lies 
mainly in one of the above areas are encouraged to submit their 
application as well. The applicants will be ranked based on i)adequacy 
to the call topics; ii) curriculum vitae; iii) letters of reference. The 
call is open to national and foreign citizens.

The grant contract will be annual, renewable for up to a total of 3 
years. The grant includes a monthly allowance of 1,495.00 EUR (no taxes 
apply), personal insurance and at least 1 trip to a conference per year. 
  The work will take place at both the Institute for Systems and 
Robotics (http://www.isr.ist.utl.pt) and Instituto Gulbenkian de Ci?ncia 
(http://www.igc.gulbenkian.pt) under the supervision of Prof. Pedro Lima 
and Dr. Jorge Carneiro, respectively.
The successful candidate should start January 2010 or soon thereafter.


Applicants must submit the following documents:
  ? curriculum vitae,
  ? copies of two (co-)authored publications,
  ? name and address (courier and email),
  ? two reference letters, and
  ? scan of PhD diploma.

Documents must be sent by courier or (preferably) e-mail to:

c/o  Dr. Porf?rio Silva
ISR - Torre Norte, 6th floor
Instituto Superior T?cnico
Av. Rovisco Pais, 1049-001
Lisboa, Portugal
E-mail: porfiriosilva at isr.ist.utl.pt
Fax: +351-21 8418291, c/o Porf?rio Silva.

From sylvain.calinon at iit.it  Mon Oct 19 08:28:00 2009
From: sylvain.calinon at iit.it (Calinon Sylvain)
Date: Mon, 19 Oct 2009 17:28:00 +0200
Subject: [robotics-worldwide] New book "Robot programming by demonstration:
	A probabilistic approach"
Message-ID: <5B2D6D6DDD42414A91B85B082D7C5FC4F2E858@EDEN-CLU.netexchange.int.netscalibur.it>

Dear Colleagues,

I am very pleased to announce that the following book has been
published.

"Robot programming by demonstration: A probabilistic approach", Sylvain
Calinon, 2009. 222 pages, hardcover. EPFL Press ISBN 978-2-940222-31-5.
CRC Press ISBN 978-1-4398-0867-2.

Author's page:
http://programming-by-demonstration.org/book.php 

Publisher's page:
http://www.epflpress.com/livres/EPFL978-2-940222-31-5.html 


About this book:
Robot Programming by Demonstration (PbD) examines methods by which a
robot learns new skills through human guidance. Also referred to as
learning by imitation, tutelage or apprenticeship learning, PbD takes
inspiration from the way humans learn new skills by imitation, thereby
developing methods by which new skills can be transmitted to a robot.
PbD covers a broad range of applications. In industrial settings, the
goal is to reduce the time and costs required to program the robot,
where the rationale is to create, modify or assemble a product in a very
rapid way without requiring help from an expert in robotics. PbD is
perceived as particularly useful when it comes to service robots, i.e.,
robots deemed to work in direct collaboration with humans. In this case,
methods for PbD go beyond transferring skills and offer new ways for the
robot to interact with the human, from being capable of recognizing
people's motion to predicting their intentions and seconding them in the
accomplishment of complex tasks. The present work addresses both
challenges in investigating methods by which PbD is used to provide the
robot with a generic and adaptive model of control.
"Robot programming by demonstration: A probabilistic approach" takes a
practitioner's perspective and is relevant for anyone involved in
robotics research or human-robot interaction, or who simply wants to
discover and understand how to transfer skills to robots by imitation.
The findings presented in this book emerge from various disciplines such
as robot control, human-robot interaction, applied machine learning and
artificial intelligence. It also takes insights from developmental and
cognitive psychology. The book contains a large set of didactic and
illustrative examples linked with comprehensive and practical machine
learning sourcecodes available online.


Best regards,
Sylvain

--
Sylvain Calinon, PhD
Team leader - Advanced Robotics Dept,
Italian Institute of Technology (IIT),
Via Morego 30, 16163 Genova
http://programming-by-demonstration.org




From yangl at HLT.UTDALLAS.EDU  Sun Oct 18 18:54:23 2009
From: yangl at HLT.UTDALLAS.EDU (Yang Liu)
Date: Sun, 18 Oct 2009 20:54:23 -0500
Subject: [robotics-worldwide] ICMI-MLMI 2009 final Call for participants
Message-ID: <Pine.LNX.4.63.0910161702490.16170@hlt.utdallas.edu>


    =========   ICMI-MLMI 2009 Call for participants  ==========
                 Cambridge, MA, USA,  November 2-6

The conference will take place at the MIT Media Lab, widely known for its
innovative spirit. Organized in Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA, ICMI-MLMI 09 
provides an excellent setting for brainstorming and sharing the latest
advances in multimodal interaction, systems and methods in an inspired setting 
of a city, known as one of the top historical, technological and scientific 
centers of the US.


Technical program is online,
see http://icmi2009.acm.org/Program.html for more information.

Invited speakers:

Cynthia Breazeal, MIT, "Living Better with Robots";

Stephen Brewster, University of Glasgow, "Head-up interaction: Can we 
break our addiction to the screen and keyboard?";

Fr?d?ric Kaplan, EPFL, "Are Gesture-based Interfaces The Future of Human 
Computer Interaction?".


Program commitee:

General Co-chairs:
     James Crowley, INRIA
     Yuri Ivanov, MERL
     Christopher Wren, Google
Program Co-Chairs
     Daniel Gatica-Perez, Idiap Research Institute
     Michael Johnston, AT&T Research
     Rainer Stiefelhagen University of Karlsruhe
Treasurer
     Janet McAndless,MERL
Sponsorship
     Herv? Bourlard, Idiap Research Institute
Student Chair
     Rana el Kaliouby, MIT Media Lab
Student Volunteer Chair
     Matthew Berlin, MIT Media Lab
Local Arrangements
     Clifton Forlines, MERL
     Deb Roy, MIT Media Lab
     Thanks to Cole Krumbholz, MITRE
Publicity
     Sonya Allin , University of Toronto
     Yang Liu, University of Texas at Dallas
Publications
     Louis-Philippe Morency , University of South California
Workshops
     Xilin Chen, JDL
     Steve Renals, University of Edinburgh
Demos
     Denis Lalanne, University of Fribourg
     Enrique Vidal, Polytechnic University of Valencia
Posters
     Kenji Mase, University of Nagoya

ICMI Advisory Board
     Matthew Turk, Chair, UC Santa Barbara (USA)
     Jim Crowley, INRIA-Rhone Alpes (France)
     Trevor Darrell, UCB/ICSI (USA)
     Kenji Mase, University of Nagoya (Japan)
     Eric Horvitz, Microsoft Research (USA)
     Sharon Oviatt, Adapx (USA)
     Fabio Pianesi, ITC-irst (Italy)
     Wolfgang Wahlster, DFKI (Germany)
     Jie Yang, Carnegie Mellon University (USA)

MLMI Advisory Board
     Herv? Bourlard, Idiap Research Institute (Switzerland)
     Steve Renals, University of Edinburgh (UK)
     Sharon Oviatt, Adapx (USA)
     Rainer Stiefelhagen, Universitaet Karlsruhe (Germany)
     Jean Carletta, University of Edinburgh (UK)
     Catherine Pelachaud, CNRS (France)
     Sadaoki Furui, Tokyo Institute of Technology (Japan)
     Samy Bengio, Google (USA)
     Andrei Popescu-Belis, Idiap Research Institute (Switzerland)

From esposito at usna.edu  Tue Oct 20 19:19:29 2009
From: esposito at usna.edu (Joel Esposito)
Date: Tue, 20 Oct 2009 22:19:29 -0400
Subject: [robotics-worldwide] CFP:  Novel Approaches in Robotics Education,
	ASEE
Message-ID: <C98CFE968F494552A16CF7FAEA33F3B2@dynamic.usna.edu>

Call for Papers: ASEE Computers in Education Journal 
Special Issue: Novel Approaches in Robotics Education.   

*** Submission Deadline:   April 15 2010 
E-mail submissions to ed-pub at crosslink.net   
Articles should be approximately 6-10 pages, MS Word documents
Papers addressing undergraduate education are of particular interest.  A
sampling of topics follows.   For questions regarding scope, contact the
editor:   Joel Esposito, Assoc. Prof. Systems Engineering, US Naval Academy
esposito at usna.edu

* Descriptions of novel courses at the undergraduate or master's levels,
especially those with a laboratory or project component:  Examples include
underwater robotics, micro-robotics, biologically inspired robotics, etc.
Quality submissions may include as appropriate: motivation, learning
objectives, description of laboratory or design projects, assessment and
student feedback.    

* Descriptions of robotics curricula:  Examples include Bachelors and
Master's level programs granting degrees in Robotics, as well as Minor or
Certificate programs.   Issues of interest may include: intended skill set
of graduates, program philosophy, curricular structure, assessment and
accreditation issues, capstone experiences, and profiles of graduates.

* Descriptions of project based learning experiences:   Examples include
novel open-ended laboratories, intra-mural or inter-collegiate competitions,
challenge problems, and capstone designs.   Issues of interest may include:
explanation of rules and logistics, competition structure, required skills,
sample hardware designs and intended educational outcomes are useful.
 
* Proposals or position papers on Introductory Robotics Courses:  Is there a
consensus on a national model of what a modern first course in robotics
should include?   Are the topics entirely department or instructor
dependant?   Is there an appropriate balance between Articulated and Mobile
robotic topics? What is the balance between Mechatronic, Kinematic, Learning
or Algorithmic approaches?  Are topics such as Computer Vision or Artificial
intelligence at the periphery or does a balanced treatment include them in a
first course?     
 
Please note that courses which do not include technical content specific to
robotics, but rather use robotics hardware as a "hook" for achieving other
objectives (ex. teaching introductory programming skills, or simulating
interest in engineering careers) are not appropriate for the special issue,
though are generally within the scope of the journal.     

==================================
Assoc. Professor Joel M. Esposito
Dept. of Weapons and Systems Engineering
105 Maryland Ave.  
Annapolis, MD 21402
http://www.usna.edu/Users/weapsys/esposito/


From tpadir at WPI.EDU  Wed Oct 21 08:51:16 2009
From: tpadir at WPI.EDU (Taskin Padir)
Date: Wed, 21 Oct 2009 11:51:16 -0400
Subject: [robotics-worldwide] Call for Participation: IEEE Conf. on
 Technologies for Practical Robot Applications
Message-ID: <4ADF2DF4.4050803@wpi.edu>

Greetings from TePRA 2009 Organizing Committee!

---------------------------
IEEE International Conference on Technologies for Practical Robot
Applications (TePRA)

November 9-10, 2009
Greater Boston Area, Massachusetts, USA

www.ieeerobot-tepra.org
---------------------------

Call for Participation
The 2nd Annual IEEE International Conference on Technologies for 
Practical Robot Applications (TePRA) will be held in Woburn, 
Massachusetts, USA on November 9-10, 2009. TePRA is aimed at catalyzing 
the development of enabling technologies and encouraging their adoption 
by robot designers. Please see the conference website for further details.

2009 TePRA will feature 8 technical sessions with 39 presentations, a 
student competition sponsored by iRobot, robot demonstrations, keynote 
speakers and a panel discussion chaired by Helen Greiner, The Droid 
Works, Inc. Technical Program Highlights:

Plenary Speakers:
   - Kevin Blankespoor
       Chief Engineer for the BigDog Program, Boston Dynamics
   - Steve Roux
       Senior Group Leader, Reticle Positioning, ASML, Inc.
   - Charles Remsberg,
       CEO, Hocoma, Inc.

Panel Discussion:
   - Helen Greiner (Chair)
       CEO, The Droid Works, Inc.
   - Col. Barry L. Shoop
       United States Military Academy
   - Ben Riley
       Rapid Reaction Technology Office
   - Jim Overholt
       TARDEC

Conference Tracks:
   Robot Applications Track:
   - Medical and Rehabilitation Robotics
   - Military and Security Robotics
   - Actuation and Manipulation
   - Consumer Robotics

   Robot Technologies Track:
   - Computation
   - Power, Communication and Other Technologies
   - Navigation
   - Sensing

Please see the conference website for further details and registration 
information.

Hope to see you at TePRA 2009!

Website: www.ieeerobot-tepra.org
Email: info at ieeerobot-tepra.org

Conference Chair
   Helen Greiner, Founder and CEO, The Droid Works, Inc.
Technical Program Chairs
   Michael A. Gennert, Worcester Polytechnic Institute
   William R. Michalson, Worcester Polytechnic Institute
Conference Secretary
   John Conrad, Textron Defense Systems
Publications Chair
   Karen Panetta, Tufts University
Publicity Chair
   Peter Meyer, Philips
Technical Program Coordinator
   Taskin Padir, Worcester Polytechnic Institute
Tutorials Chair
   Ted Kochanski, University of New Hampshire
Exhibits Chair
   Sorin Faibish, EMC
Demonstrations Chair
   Ryan Pettigrew, IEEE RAS Boston Chapter
Student Liaison Chair
   William Agassounon, Textron Defense Systems
Sponsorships Chair
   Nithyanandam Mathiyazhagan, Management Consultant
Local Arrangements Chair
   Bob Alongi, IEEE Boston Section


-- 
  Taskin Padir, Ph.D.
  Robotics Engineering
  Electrical and Computer Engineering
  Worcester Polytechnic Institute
  Ph. +(508)831-6427

From Claudio.Castellini at dlr.de  Thu Oct 22 03:02:57 2009
From: Claudio.Castellini at dlr.de (Claudio.Castellini at dlr.de)
Date: Thu, 22 Oct 2009 12:02:57 +0200
Subject: [robotics-worldwide] NIPS 2009 workshop on Learning from Multiple
	Sources with Applications to Robotics, Final call for contributions
References: <200910221159.09576.forabona@idiap.ch>
Message-ID: <8A5864ED13DE8A46881680C4EC4C6C04403CC8@exbe5.intra.dlr.de>

------------------------------------------------------------------
                   FINAL CALL FOR CONTRIBUTIONS

       NIPS 2009 workshop on Learning from Multiple Sources
                  with Applications to Robotics
              Whistler, BC, Canada, December 12, 2009

        http://www.dcs.gla.ac.uk/~srogers/lms09/index.htm
------------------------------------------------------------------

Important Dates:
----------------

Submission of extended abstracts: October 27, 2009

Notification of acceptance: November 6, 2009



Workshop Description:
---------------------

Learning from multiple sources denotes the problem of jointly
learning from a set of (partially) related learning problems /
views / tasks. This general concept underlies several subfields
receiving increasing interest from the machine learning community,
which differ in terms of the assumptions made about the dependency
structure between learning problems. In particular, the concept
includes topics such as data fusion, transfer learning, multitask
learning, multiview learning, and learning under covariate shift.
Several approaches for inferring and exploiting complex
relationships between data sources have been presented, including
both generative and discriminative approaches.

The workshop will provide a unified forum for cutting edge
research on learning from multiple sources; the workshop will
examine the general concept, theory and methods, and will also
examine *robotics* as a natural application domain for learning
from multiple sources. The workshop will address methodological
challenges in the different subtopics and further interaction
between them. The intended audience is researchers working in
fields of multi-modal learning, data fusion, and robotics.

(More detailed background information is available at the
workshop website.)

The workshop includes a morning session focused on theory/methods,
and an afternoon session focused on the robotics application.

The workshop is a core event of the PASCAL2 Network of Excellence.


PASCAL2 Invited Speakers:
-------------------------

Morning Session: Chris Williams - University of Edinburgh

Afternoon Session: Ingmar Posner  - University of Oxford


Submission Instructions:
------------------------

We invite submission of extended abstracts to the workshop.
Extended abstracts should be 2-4 pages, formatted in the NIPS
style: http://nips.cc/PaperInformation/StyleFiles
Unlike the main NIPS conference, identities of authors do not
need to be removed from the extended abstracts.

Extended abstracts should be sent in .PDF or .PS file format by
email, to either D.Hardoon at cs.ucl.ac.uk or gleen at cis.hut.fi.
Acceptance to the workshop will be determined based on peer
review of each extended abstract.

Submissions are expected to represent high-quality, novel
contributions in theory/methods of learning from multiple sources,
or high-quality, novel contributions in application of learning
from multiple sources to robotics (see below).

To encourage participants from the machine learning community 
to test their algorithms in the domain of robotics, we provide 
a dataset, with computed features, representative of open research
issues in robotics; see the workshop webpage for details.
Robotics-oriented papers submitted to the workshop are strongly 
encouraged to contain an experimental evaluation on the database.
The obtained results will be presented by the organizers during 
the workshop.

Submitted extended abstracts may be accepted either as an oral
presentation or as a poster presentation; there will be only a
limited number of oral presentations in the morning and afternoon
sessions.

Accepted extended abstracts will be made available online at the
workshop website.

Depending on the quality of submissions, we will consider
preparing a special issue of a journal or a collected volume on
the topic of the workshop. A separate call for papers will then
be issued after the workshop for the special issue/collected
volume. Last year's "Learning from Multiple Sources" workshop led
to a special issue in Machine Learning (currently in progress).


Organisers
----------

* Barbara Caputo - Idiap Research Institute.
* Nicol? Cesa-Bianchi - Universit?  degli Studi di Milan.
* David Hardoon - Institute for Infocomm Research (I2R).
* Gayle Leen - Helsinki University of Technology.
* Francesco Orabona - Idiap Research Institure.
* Jaakko Peltonen - Helsinki University of Technology.
* Simon Rogers - University of Glasgow.


Programme Committee
-------------------

* C?dric Archambeau - Xerox Research.
* Andreas Argyriou - Toyota Technological Institute.
* Claudio Gentile - Universit?  dell'Insubria.
* Mark Girolami - University of Glasgow.
* Samuel Kaski - Helsinki University of Technology.
* Arto Klami - Helsinki University of Technology.
* John Shawe-Taylor - University College London.
* Giorgio Valentini - Universit?  degli Studi di Milan.


Contact Persons
---------------

For questions about the workshop, contact David R. Hardoon at
D.Hardoon AT cs.ucl.ac.uk.

-------------------------------------------------------
--
Dr. Francesco Orabona, Post-Doc

Idiap Research Institute
Centre du Parc
P.O. Box 592
Rue Marconi 19
CH-1920 Martigny
Switzerland

tel: +41 277 217 757
fax: +41 277 217 712
email: forabona at idiap.ch
www.idiap.ch/~forabona


From jmh at cs.utah.edu  Fri Oct 23 08:22:19 2009
From: jmh at cs.utah.edu (John Hollerbach)
Date: Fri, 23 Oct 2009 09:22:19 -0600
Subject: [robotics-worldwide] IJRR OnlineFirst articles for the period for
 the period 28 Sep 2009 to 22 Oct 2009
Message-ID: <4AE1CA2B.3000103@cs.utah.edu>

New IJRR OnlineFirst articles have been made available
(for the period 28 Sep 2009 to 22 Oct 2009):

Motion Analysis with Experimental Verification of the Hybrid Robot 
PEOPLER-II for Reversible Switch between Walk and Roll on Demand
     Tokuji Okada, Wagner Tanaka Botelho, and Toshimi Shimizu
     The International Journal of Robotics Research published 13 October 
2009, 10.1177/0278364909348762
     http://ijr.sagepub.com/cgi/content/abstract/0278364909348762v1

On the Design and Use of a Micro Air Vehicle to Track and Avoid Adversaries
     Ruijie He, Abraham Bachrach, Michael Achtelik, Alborz Geramifard, 
Daniel Gurdan, Samuel Prentice, Jan Stumpf, and Nicholas Roy
     The International Journal of Robotics Research published 1 October 
2009, 10.1177/0278364909348805
     http://ijr.sagepub.com/cgi/content/abstract/0278364909348805v1

FISST-SLAM: Finite Set Statistical Approach to Simultaneous Localization 
and Mapping
     B. Kalyan, K. W. Lee, and W. S. Wijesoma
     The International Journal of Robotics Research published 1 October 
2009, 10.1177/0278364909349948
     http://ijr.sagepub.com/cgi/content/abstract/0278364909349948v1

Three-dimensional Motion Planning Algorithms for Steerable Needles Using 
Inverse Kinematics
     Vincent Duindam, Jijie Xu, Ron Alterovitz, Shankar Sastry, and Ken 
Goldberg
     The International Journal of Robotics Research published 22 October 
2009, 10.1177/0278364909352202
     http://ijr.sagepub.com/cgi/content/abstract/0278364909352202v1

Multi-modal Motion Planning in Non-expansive Spaces
     Kris Hauser and Jean-Claude Latombe
     The International Journal of Robotics Research published 22 October 
2009, 10.1177/0278364909352098
     http://ijr.sagepub.com/cgi/content/abstract/0278364909352098v1

From hpeng at umich.edu  Fri Oct 23 18:03:20 2009
From: hpeng at umich.edu (Peng, Huei)
Date: Fri, 23 Oct 2009 21:03:20 -0400
Subject: [robotics-worldwide] Faculty position at University of Michigan,
	Ann Arbor
Message-ID: <7DA3E39E2D197A47A534A2638A72056103C999EB38@ITCS-ECLS-1-VS3.adsroot.itcs.umich.edu>

Mechanical Engineering


Faculty Positions Announcement

The Department of Mechanical Engineering, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, seeks candidates for multiple full-time tenure-track faculty positions. We are interested in all candidates who have strong backgrounds in fundamental disciplines related to mechanical engineering.  We aim to enhance the Department's research and education capability in the following thematic areas: (1) emerging manufacturing (e.g., personalized production, green energy manufacturing, nano manufacturing, biomedical manufacturing, manufacturing sustainability), and/or (2) future transportation systems (e.g., mobile robots, autonomous vehicles, alternative powertrains, transportation electrification).  One can learn more about the Department through reviewing the departmental webpage at: http://me.engin.umich.edu/.

Applicants should have an earned Ph.D. in mechanical engineering or related fields.  The main focus of this search is on junior faculty, but more senior level appointments may be considered for applicants with exceptional credentials and national/international stature.  We seek candidates who will provide inspiration and leadership in research and will contribute proactively to teaching and to the diversity of the academic community.  For best consideration, candidates are encouraged to apply now and certainly before January 5, 2010 as applications will be reviewed immediately upon receipt.

All applicants should submit in PDF format (1) a detailed resume, (2) a statement of research and teaching interests, and (3) the names and contact information of at least three references. Applications must be submitted electronically at http://www.engin.umich.edu/apply/ME.    The University of Michigan is a non-discriminatory, affirmative action employer, and is responsive to the needs of dual career families.



From terry.huntsberger at jpl.nasa.gov  Sat Oct 24 08:33:01 2009
From: terry.huntsberger at jpl.nasa.gov (Terry Huntsberger)
Date: Sat, 24 Oct 2009 08:33:01 -0700
Subject: [robotics-worldwide] Second CFP - Journal of Field Robotics Special
	Issue on State of the Art in Maritime Autonomous Surface and
	Underwater Vehicles
Message-ID: <5FF40E5F-CCC6-41CE-B3A4-8B02BEE7C827@jpl.nasa.gov>

This is the Second Call for Papers for the Journal of Field Robotics  
Special Issue
on State of the Art in Maritime Autonomous Surface and Underwater  
Vehicles.

Special Issue on State of the Art in Maritime Autonomous Surface and  
Underwater Vehicles

Special Issue Guest Editors: Terry Huntsberger, Jet Propulsion  
Laboratory, Michael Keegan,
Naval Undersea Warfare Center, Newport Division & Robert Brizzolara,  
Office of Naval Research

This Special Issue focuses on state-of-the-art developments in  
maritime autonomy and control
for autonomous surface vehicles (ASVs) and autonomous underwater  
vehicles (AUVs). The
maritime domain poses a number of challenges for the development of  
autonomy algorithms
for these types of vehicles. Among the these challenges are the  
oftentimes low bandwidth or
no communication links with a control station, no easy access to GPS  
information for localization
in the case of AUVs, widely varying sea-state conditions, possible  
limited sensing capabilities due
to power and volume constraints, and strong currents and winds. A  
previous (June 2007) Special
Issue of the Journal of Field Robotics on AUVs concentrated on  
platforms, monitoring and
characterization of maritime environments, and vehicle health  
management.  The goal of this
Special Issue is to publish outstanding results in the maturation and  
testing of the autonomy
technologies for both autonomous sea surface and underwater vehicles  
that are currently
being fielded through collaborations between university, industry and  
military. The concentration
of the Special Issue will be on systems that have been tested in the  
field.

List of topics
?               Autonomy for coordinated operations between  
autonomous maritime vehicles
?               Real-time, onboard optimization of planning & execution
?               Autonomy for heterogeneous maritime vehicles
?               Adaptive and/or variable levels of autonomy
?               Maritime image understanding for domain awareness
?               Higher-level autonomy algorithms in the decision- 
making and control loops
?               Sensors and sensor processing algorithms/fusion for  
maritime vehicle autonomy
?               Obstacle avoidance, and other GNC functions for  
autonomous navigation
?               Human-machine interfaces for control of single and  
multiple maritime autonomous vehicles
?               Biologically inspired approaches to intelligent  
autonomy for autonomous maritime vehicles
?               Collaborative control of multiple heterogeneous  
autonomous vehicles
?               Fleet management of autonomous vehicles operating  
under heterogeneous constraints on
                 control and communication

Authors are encouraged to submit multimedia attachments to the paper  
(data sets, models and videos)
as a means of enhancing the submission.

Important Dates:
?      December 1, 2009 ? Submission of manuscripts
?      March 1, 2010 ? Reviews sent to the authors
?      June 1, 2010 ? Final manuscripts due for publication

Details for manuscript submission can be found at:

http://www.journalfieldrobotics.org/Home.html

under the "Info for Authors" tab at the top of the page.




-------------------------------------
Terry Huntsberger
http://www-robotics.jpl.nasa.gov/people/Terrance_Huntsberger
MS 198-219
Jet Propulsion Laboratory
4800 Oak Grove Drive
Pasadena, CA 91109
PH: (818) 354-5794
CELL: (818) 648-0645
FAX: (818) 393-5007




From conti at stanford.edu  Tue Oct 20 22:41:05 2009
From: conti at stanford.edu (Francois Conti)
Date: Tue, 20 Oct 2009 22:41:05 -0700
Subject: [robotics-worldwide] CHAI-3D - Open Source Haptics Project
Message-ID: <4ADE9EF1.90109@stanford.edu>

--------------------------------
CHAI-3D
Open Source Haptics Project
www.chai3d.org
--------------------------------

Dear colleagues,

We are pleased to announce the new edition of the CHAI-3D Open Source 
Haptic Libraries.

Over the past 5 years, CHAI-3D has aimed at building a high-performance, 
easy-to-use, open source framework to unify the development of 
haptic-enabled simulations and facilitate the integration of computer 
haptics in existing applications. The new version of CHAI-3D builds on 
solid development experience and user feedback, and combines the 
expertise of academic and industrial partners who contributed a large 
number of research and production projects in such diverse areas as 
games, simulators, educational software, interactive art, scientific 
visualization, robotics, and medical applications.

Written in C++, CHAI-3D has been designed to make it easier and more 
intuitive for developers to produce applications that combine 3D 
modeling with force-feedback rendering capabilities. By transparently 
supporting a variety of existing interfaces, CHAI-3D offers a unique 
framework to easily link your applications with any compatible haptic 
device connected to your computer. The new release also provides 
templates and examples to assist developers in easily integrating their 
lab-made haptic device prototypes, providing researchers with a 
convenient way to interface their device with sophisticated haptic 
simulations.

Support for third party components is also supported via extension 
modules that expand the capabilities of the CHAI-3D core foundations. 
Extension modules currently include support for various dynamics 
engines, making it possible to simulate rigid and deformable bodies in 
real time.

The new version is available for download on the CHAI-3D website.
(www.chai3d.org).

As always, we are very much looking forward to your feedback!

The CHAI-3D team
(www.chai3d.org)


-- 
Fran?ois Conti
Department of Computer Science
Gates Building 1A, #118
Stanford University
California, 94305

t: (650) 725-8809
e: conti at stanford.edu
u: http://ai.stanford.edu/~conti




From aruta at versita.com  Tue Oct 20 11:44:41 2009
From: aruta at versita.com (Andrzej Ruta / Versita)
Date: Tue, 20 Oct 2009 14:44:41 -0400
Subject: [robotics-worldwide] Paladyn. Journal of Behavioral Robotics
Message-ID: <305F28E3255CDD48961B6A36EE36F1389E91A933E7@VMBX112.ihostexchange.net>

Dear Robotics Worldwide subscriber,

I am a Managing Editor of "Paladyn. Journal of Behavioral Robotics" (http://www.versita.com/science/engineering/paladyn/). Paladyn is a new journal launched by Versita (www.versita.com<http://www.versita.com>), one of the leading science publishers in Central and Eastern Europe. Our ambition is to become recognized worldwide in the robotics community not only through publishing the top-quality research
articles, but also through excelling other publishers by being faster, more active and more online in everything we do. In pursue of this target, we would like to attract to our journal a number of recognized scientists in all
subfields of robotics, from both academia and industry. Perhaps you are among the potential Paladyn's authors? Please read below a short description of the journal to decide.

Paladyn is a peer-reviewed, online only journal intended to serve as a premier source of knowledge and an exachange platform for all those engaged or interested in the emerging field of behavioral robotics. The journal focuses on the original high-quality research results that cover such topics as: cognitive robotics, evolutionary robotics, robot control, learning and adaptation, artificial intelligence, machine vision, affective robotics and many more. The full Paladyn's scope, subject to constant changes, can be viewed at
http://www.versita.com/science/engineering/paladyn/authors/aims_and_scope/ . In general, we will welcome good manuscripts whenever they present novel behavior-based or nature-inspired concepts, designs or applications of robots and other autonomous and intellligent systems. We are open to the contributions
from all over the world and we are ready to promote different viewpoints on robotics, regardless of the authors' research background, from robot engineers and computer scientists to physicists, biologists or psychologists. Our motto is: excellence through diversity.

Regarding the journal's organization, Paladyn will start publishing quarterly, with approximately ten papers per issue, depending on the manuscript inflow. The first issue of Paladyn is scheduled for January 2010. Paper submission is handled online via Editorial Manager platform available at
http://www.editorialmanager.com/paladyn/ . We already have the first submissions being processed in our system. The paper processing overview is given at http://www.versita.com/editool/em-review/ . The Editor-in-Chief of Paladyn is Prof. Raja Chatila, LAAS-CNRS, France. Our new publishing project is also supported by a professional editorial team and a number of Editorial Advisory Board members - all being worldwide-recognized experts in their disciplines. For full details, please refer to
http://www.versita.com/science/engineering/paladyn/editors/ .

As an author of Paladyn you can have a range of benefits:

- fast and constructive peer review,
- international range,
- convenient, web-based paper submission system - Editorial Manager,
- high-quality electronic publication technology based on Metapress platform,
- extensive promotion of each published article to hundreds of researchers working in the same field,
- free language-correction services for non-English-speaking authors of accepted papers,
- no publication charge.

We look forward to your manuscripts!

You may also want to consider joining our Editorial Advisory Board (EAB). The main expectations we have from EAB members is to give us occasional advice on the strategic issues regarding the journal and promote it in the robotics community, i.e. recommend it to colleagues, PhD students, librarians etc. Apart from EAB members, we are looking for a few more editors to cover selected topics related to behavioral robotics. If you think, you could use your research experience in any of the areas specified in the journal's scope to edit the manuscripts submitted to Paladyn, or if you would like to cover a new, emerging topic, please, send your application to the Managing Editor at aruta at versita.com. Finally, if you simply support Paladyn, its ethos and its mission, you are kindly encouraged to spread the information about the journal whenever an opportunity occurs. Our flyer available at http://www.versita.com/UserFiles/File/Authors/Paladyn/flyer.pdf may be useful
for such purposes.

Sincerely yours,

Andrzej Ruta, Ph.D.
Managing Editor
Paladyn. Journal of Behavioral Robotics
www.versita.com/science/engineering/paladyn/<http://www.versita.com/science/engineering/paladyn/>
aruta at versita.com

From robotics.researcher at gmail.com  Wed Oct 21 00:54:50 2009
From: robotics.researcher at gmail.com (Win Tun Latt)
Date: Wed, 21 Oct 2009 15:54:50 +0800
Subject: [robotics-worldwide] Opening for a post-doc position
Message-ID: <68b2d4180910210054ibbcf6b3o86a36d05d3df5939@mail.gmail.com>

*Dear Robotics researchers,*
**
**
*We have an open position for a post-doctoral fellowship in the area of
biomedical robotics. *

**

*Position : Post-doc in Biomedical Robotics*


*Summary*
The BioRobotics Group at the Robotics Research Centre in Nanyang
Technological University, Singapore is developing state-of-the-art robotics
technology in biomedical and healthcare related applications, with key
research interests spanning robot-assisted surgery and diagnosis,
rehabilitation robotics and mechatronics, and assistive technology. There is
an immediate opening for a Robotics Research Engineer in which the primary
focus includes design, development, integration and testing of cutting edge
hardware and software systems for robotic systems in a team setting. The
engineer develops these products from research idea to working prototypes
and also works extensively with hardware devices such as piezoelectric
actuators, a variety of sensors, optical microscopes, high speed smart
cameras, motorized stages, high speed communications systems and real time
data acquisition, processing, logging and control. Various third party
hardware and software packages will be integrated onto the robotics platform
and help mature these technologies through continuous field testing.

*Requirements*

?  Ph.D. degree in Mechatronics, Computer Science or an Engineering
Discipline or equivalent combination of training and experience.

?  Systems engineering experience.

?  Experience with software development, hardware/software integration and
debugging of instrumented computer-controlled systems or similar
robotics-related technology including the use of debuggers, memory analysis
tools, module breakdown, documentation, design reviews, implementation,
testing and results analysis.

?  Strong programming skills in C/C++, LabView, LabViewRT, Matlab, bash
shell scripting and makefiles.

?  Flexible environment background to include Linux, QNX and MS Windows
software development.

?  Strong analytical and problem solving skills, and independent
decision-making abilities. Both independent and team-oriented work will be
required. The ability to work in a team setting and to interface
successfully with external suppliers and partners will be important.

?  Good communication and interpersonal skills, team awareness, systems
performance understanding, test preparation, results analysis, on-the-fly
debugging, ability to pay close attention to detail, remain calm during
difficult situations and work with difficult individuals while maintaining
composure.

?  Enthusiasm for learning, and willingness to develop non-software skills
(electronics, mechanical, etc.) as needed to complete challenging projects.

?  Laboratory working environment but candidate must be willing to
participate occasionally in field experiments and evaluations.


*Contact*
Applicants should submit as soon as possible: (i) detail resume or
curriculum vitae, (ii) tell us briefly and concisely about your field of
research/reesearch interests by email to:

*Assistant Professor Ang Wei Tech*
Email: wtang at ntu.edu.sg
Homepage: http://www.ntu.edu.sg/home/wtang



*DO NOT send large doc or pdf files.*

In the *email subject header*, please mention your *NAME*. For example, if
your name is *John Doe*, use email subject: *John Doe Robotics Research
Engineer*.

If your field of research is not directly related but have a strong passion
for research in Medical Robotics and want to make an impact on human lives,
we would also be delighted to hear from you.

From auke.ijspeert at epfl.ch  Mon Oct 26 06:22:56 2009
From: auke.ijspeert at epfl.ch (Auke Ijspeert)
Date: Mon, 26 Oct 2009 14:22:56 +0100
Subject: [robotics-worldwide] EPFL Center for Neuroprosthetics / Faculty
 Positions at the interface of Neuroscience and Bioengineering
Message-ID: <4AE5A2B0.1020200@epfl.ch>


      EPFL Center for Neuroprosthetics / Faculty Positions at the
      interface of Neuroscience and Bioengineering

The Institute of Bioengineering and the Brain-Mind Institute at EPFL 
invite applications for faculty positions at all ranks, from *tenure 
track assistant professor to full professor*, for the newly-launched 
*Center for Neuroprosthetics*. The Center, situated between the School 
of Engineering and the School of Life Sciences, seeks outstanding 
individuals working in (1) hearing, and (2) other areas of 
neuroprosthetics, such as invasive and non-invasive sensing and 
stimulation in restoration of motor control or sensory perception such 
as vision. The open faculty positions are offered in an environment of 
both theoretical and experimental research, rich for the development of 
novel enabling technologies as well as for seeking deeper understanding 
of fundamental mechanisms underlying the field of neuroprosthetics.

The School of Engineering and the Institute of Bioengineering offer 
strength in areas that include bio-MEMS/NEMS, bioelectronics, robotics 
and learning, integrated systems, biomaterials, biophotonics, molecular 
and computational systems biology, and stem cell biotechnology.  The 
Brain-Mind Institute offers a broader context of neuroscience, with 
strengths in cognition, behavior, cellular and molecular neuroscience, 
computational neuroscience, and neurodegeneration, among others.

Excellent experimental infrastructure are available including core 
facilities in animal physiological and behavioral phenomics, animal and 
human imaging, quantitative light microscopy, genomics and proteomics, 
micro- and nano-fabrication, and electron microscopy and surface analysis.

Successful candidates are expected to initiate independent, creative 
research programs and participate in undergraduate and graduate 
teaching. Internationally competitive salaries, start-up resources and 
benefits are offered.

Applications should include a curriculum vitae with a list of 
publications, a concise statement of research and teaching interests, 
and the names and addresses (including e-mail) of at least five 
referees. Applications should be uploaded to:

*http://neuroprosthetics-rec.epfl.ch* <http://neuroprosthetics-rec.epfl.ch/>

The deadline for applications is *1 February 2010*.

Enquiries may be addressed to:
*Prof. Jeffrey A. Hubbell
*E-mail: *neuroprosthetics-rec at epfl.ch* 
<mailto:neuroprosthetics-rec at epfl.ch>

For additional information on EPFL, the Schools of Engineering and Life 
Sciences, the Institute of Bioengineering, and the Brain-Mind Institute, 
and Institute of Bioengineering, please consult the web sites:* 
http://www.epfl.ch <http://www.epfl.ch/>,* *http://sti.epfl.ch 
<http://sti.epfl.ch/>, http://sv.epfl.ch <http://sv.epfl.ch/>,* 
*http://bmi.epfl.ch <http://bmi.epfl.ch/>*, and *http://ibi.epfl.ch* 
<http://ibi.epfl.ch/>

EPFL aims to increase the presence of women amongst its faculty, and 
qualified female candidates are strongly encouraged to apply.

-- 
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Prof Auke Jan Ijspeert 
Associate Professor

EPFL-IC-ISIM-GRIJ
EPFL, Swiss Federal Institute of Technology, Lausanne
Station 14
CH 1015 Lausanne, Switzerland 

Office: INN 237     Tel: +41 21 693 2658,    Fax: +41 21 693 3705
www: http://birg.epfl.ch             Email: Auke.Ijspeert at epfl.ch
-----------------------------------------------------------------


From bremen79 at gmail.com  Tue Oct 27 08:41:40 2009
From: bremen79 at gmail.com (Francesco Orabona)
Date: Tue, 27 Oct 2009 16:41:40 +0100
Subject: [robotics-worldwide] NIPS 2009 workshop on Learning from Multiple
	Sources with Applications to Robotics, EXTENDED DEADLINE
Message-ID: <8c908c740910270841q78ba487esabaf271ec676ce18@mail.gmail.com>

------------------------------------------------------------------
         FINAL CALL FOR CONTRIBUTIONS - EXTENDED DEADLINE

       NIPS 2009 workshop on Learning from Multiple Sources
                  with Applications to Robotics
              Whistler, BC, Canada, December 12, 2009

        http://www.dcs.gla.ac.uk/~srogers/lms09/index.htm
------------------------------------------------------------------

Important Dates:
----------------

Submission of extended abstracts: November 2, 2009 (extended deadline)

Notification of acceptance: November 10, 2009



Workshop Description:
---------------------

Learning from multiple sources denotes the problem of jointly
learning from a set of (partially) related learning problems /
views / tasks. This general concept underlies several subfields
receiving increasing interest from the machine learning community,
which differ in terms of the assumptions made about the dependency
structure between learning problems. In particular, the concept
includes topics such as data fusion, transfer learning, multitask
learning, multiview learning, and learning under covariate shift.
Several approaches for inferring and exploiting complex
relationships between data sources have been presented, including
both generative and discriminative approaches.

The workshop will provide a unified forum for cutting edge
research on learning from multiple sources; the workshop will
examine the general concept, theory and methods, and will also
examine *robotics* as a natural application domain for learning
from multiple sources. The workshop will address methodological
challenges in the different subtopics and further interaction
between them. The intended audience is researchers working in
fields of multi-modal learning, data fusion, and robotics.

(More detailed background information is available at the
workshop website.)

The workshop includes a morning session focused on theory/methods,
and an afternoon session focused on the robotics application.

The workshop is a core event of the PASCAL2 Network of Excellence.


PASCAL2 Invited Speakers:
-------------------------

Morning Session: Chris Williams - University of Edinburgh

Afternoon Session: Ingmar Posner  - University of Oxford


Submission Instructions:
------------------------

We invite submission of extended abstracts to the workshop.
Extended abstracts should be 2-4 pages, formatted in the NIPS
style: http://nips.cc/PaperInformation/StyleFiles
Unlike the main NIPS conference, identities of authors do not
need to be removed from the extended abstracts.

Extended abstracts should be sent in .PDF or .PS file format by
email, to either D.Hardoon at cs.ucl.ac.uk or gleen at cis.hut.fi.
Acceptance to the workshop will be determined based on peer
review of each extended abstract.

Submissions are expected to represent high-quality, novel
contributions in theory/methods of learning from multiple sources,
or high-quality, novel contributions in application of learning
from multiple sources to robotics (see below).

To encourage participants from the machine learning community
to test their algorithms in the domain of robotics, we provide
a dataset, with computed features, representative of open research
issues in robotics; see the workshop webpage for details.
Robotics-oriented papers submitted to the workshop are strongly
encouraged to contain an experimental evaluation on the database.
The obtained results will be presented by the organizers during
the workshop.

Submitted extended abstracts may be accepted either as an oral
presentation or as a poster presentation; there will be only a
limited number of oral presentations in the morning and afternoon
sessions.

Accepted extended abstracts will be made available online at the
workshop website.

Depending on the quality of submissions, we will consider
preparing a special issue of a journal or a collected volume on
the topic of the workshop. A separate call for papers will then
be issued after the workshop for the special issue/collected
volume. Last year's "Learning from Multiple Sources" workshop led
to a special issue in Machine Learning (currently in progress).


Organisers
----------

* Barbara Caputo - Idiap Research Institute.
* Nicolo Cesa-Bianchi - Universita' degli Studi di Milan.
* David Hardoon - Institute for Infocomm Research (I2R).
* Gayle Leen - Helsinki University of Technology.
* Francesco Orabona - Idiap Research Institure.
* Jaakko Peltonen - Helsinki University of Technology.
* Simon Rogers - University of Glasgow.


Programme Committee
-------------------

* Cedric Archambeau - Xerox Research.
* Andreas Argyriou - Toyota Technological Institute.
* Claudio Gentile - Universita' dell'Insubria.
* Mark Girolami - University of Glasgow.
* Samuel Kaski - Helsinki University of Technology.
* Arto Klami - Helsinki University of Technology.
* John Shawe-Taylor - University College London.
* Giorgio Valentini - Universita' degli Studi di Milan.


Contact Persons
---------------

For questions about the workshop, contact David R. Hardoon at
D.Hardoon AT cs.ucl.ac.uk.

-- 
Dr. Francesco Orabona, Post-Doc

Idiap Research Institute
Centre du Parc
P.O. Box 592
Rue Marconi 19
CH-1920 Martigny
Switzerland

tel: +41 277 217 757
fax: +41 277 217 712
www.idiap.ch/~forabona

From eiichi at ieee.org  Sun Oct 25 20:47:29 2009
From: eiichi at ieee.org (Eiichi YOSHIDA)
Date: Mon, 26 Oct 2009 12:47:29 +0900
Subject: [robotics-worldwide] Humanoids 2009 Paris Registration Open
Message-ID: <20091026114940.37B4.EIICHI@ieee.org>

Dear Colleagues,

The 9th IEEE-RAS International Conference on Humanoid Robots (Humanoids09)
will be held in Paris, on December 7-10, 2009.

The registration site is open at http://www.humanoids2009.org !

We expect wide participation of researchers from related domains.

Best regards,

Jean-Paul Laumond, Humanoids 2009 General Chair

Eiichi Yoshida, Humaniods 2009 Conference Secretary



From jmh at cs.utah.edu  Mon Oct 26 10:42:59 2009
From: jmh at cs.utah.edu (John Hollerbach)
Date: Mon, 26 Oct 2009 11:42:59 -0600
Subject: [robotics-worldwide] IJRR November/December 2009 special issue on
 the 13th International Symposium on Robotics Research, 2007
Message-ID: <4AE5DFA3.40506@cs.utah.edu>

A new issue of The International Journal of Robotics Research is 
available online:
     Special Issue on the 13th International Symposium on Robotics 
Research, 2007:
     1 November 2009; Vol. 28, No. 11-12

The below Table of Contents is available online at: 
http://ijr.sagepub.com/content/vol28/issue11-12/?etoc

Annual Editorial
     John Hollerbach
     The International Journal of Robotics Research 2009;28 1403-1404
     http://ijr.sagepub.com/cgi/reprint/28/11-12/1403

Editorial: Special Issue on the 13th International Symposium on Robotics 
Research, 2007
     Makoto Kaneko and Yoshihiko Nakamura
     The International Journal of Robotics Research 2009;28 1405
     http://ijr.sagepub.com/cgi/reprint/28/11-12/1405

Navigating, Recognizing and Describing Urban Spaces With Vision and Lasers
     Paul Newman, Gabe Sibley, Mike Smith, Mark Cummins, Alastair 
Harrison, Chris Mei, Ingmar Posner, Robbie Shade, Derik Schroeter, Liz 
Murphy, Winston Churchill, Dave Cole, and Ian Reid
     The International Journal of Robotics Research 2009;28 1406-1433
     http://ijr.sagepub.com/cgi/content/abstract/28/11-12/1406

How Should Microrobots Swim?
     Jake J. Abbott, Kathrin E. Peyer, Marco Cosentino Lagomarsino, Li 
Zhang, Lixin Dong, Ioannis K. Kaliakatsos, and Bradley J. Nelson
     The International Journal of Robotics Research 2009;28 1434-1447
     http://ijr.sagepub.com/cgi/content/abstract/28/11-12/1434

The Belief Roadmap: Efficient Planning in Belief Space by Factoring the 
Covariance
     Samuel Prentice and Nicholas Roy
     The International Journal of Robotics Research 2009;28 1448-1465
     http://ijr.sagepub.com/cgi/content/abstract/28/11-12/1448

A Fast Stereo-based System for Detecting and Tracking Pedestrians from a 
Moving Vehicle
     Max Bajracharya, Baback Moghaddam, Andrew Howard, Shane Brennan, 
and Larry H. Matthies
     The International Journal of Robotics Research 2009;28 1466-1485
     http://ijr.sagepub.com/cgi/content/abstract/28/11-12/1466

Growing Hidden Markov Models: An Incremental Tool for Learning and 
Predicting Human and Vehicle Motion
     Dizan Vasquez, Thierry Fraichard, and Christian Laugier
     The International Journal of Robotics Research 2009;28 1486-1506
     http://ijr.sagepub.com/cgi/content/abstract/28/11-12/1486

Requirements for Safe Robots: Measurements, Analysis and New Insights
     Sami Haddadin, Alin Albu-Sch?ffer, and Gerd Hirzinger
     The International Journal of Robotics Research 2009;28 1507-1527
     http://ijr.sagepub.com/cgi/content/abstract/28/11-12/1507



From kuchenbe at seas.upenn.edu  Mon Oct 26 19:11:22 2009
From: kuchenbe at seas.upenn.edu (Katherine J. Kuchenbecker)
Date: Mon, 26 Oct 2009 22:11:22 -0400
Subject: [robotics-worldwide] RSS 2010: Call for Papers
Message-ID: <08A198CC-C442-46BD-8518-7B201A212BA5@seas.upenn.edu>

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Robotics Science and Systems (RSS) 2010
http://www.roboticsconference.org/
The University of Zaragoza, Spain, June 27 - June 30, 2010
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

CALL FOR PAPERS
http://www.roboticsconference.org/papercall.html

Robotics Science and Systems (RSS) brings together researchers  
working on algorithmic and mathematical foundations of robotics,  
robotics applications, and analysis of robotic systems.  The  
conference is single-track, and the final program will be the result  
of a highly selective review process, to give attendees an  
opportunity to see the best research in all areas of robotics.  The  
program will include invited talks as well as oral and poster  
presentations of refereed papers.  The main conference will be  
preceded by one and a half days of workshops and tutorials.  Every  
effort is being made to keep conference expenses affordable,  
particularly for student attendees.

This year, a short abstract is due one week prior to the full paper  
deadline.  This submission is mandatory in order to submit a full  
paper.  Authors may suggest which Area Chair should handle their  
submission.  Names of Area Chairs are listed at http:// 
www.roboticsconference.org/orgcom.html

Important Dates:
Abstract Submission: January 15, 2010, 23:59:59 PST
Full Paper Submission: January 22, 2010, 23:59:59 PST
Paper Notification: April 16, 2010
Conference: June 27-June 30, 2010

We are looking forward to seeing you in Zaragoza.

Yoky Matsuoka, RSS 2010 General Chair
Hugh Durrant-Whyte, RSS 2010 Program Chair
Jos? Neira, RSS 2010 Publications Chair
Katherine J. Kuchenbecker, RSS 2010 Publicity Chair

From lavalle at uiuc.edu  Mon Oct 26 12:39:07 2009
From: lavalle at uiuc.edu (Steven M LaValle)
Date: Mon, 26 Oct 2009 14:39:07 -0500
Subject: [robotics-worldwide] Materials from IROS 09 Tutorial on I-Spaces
Message-ID: <1256585947.11435.100.camel@localhost>

Hello,

Thanks to many of you for making the IROS tutorial
in St. Louis a great success.   For any who could 
not attend, but might be interested, here are the 
(corrected) slides and the corresponding tutorial 
article:

Filtering and Planning in Information Spaces

http://msl.cs.uiuc.edu/~lavalle/iros09/

Comments and questions are welcome.

Best wishes,

Steve


Steve LaValle
University of Illinois
http://msl.cs.uiuc.edu/~lavalle/



From jsabater at iiia.csic.es  Tue Oct 27 04:28:23 2009
From: jsabater at iiia.csic.es (Jordi Sabater Mir)
Date: Tue, 27 Oct 2009 12:28:23 +0100
Subject: [robotics-worldwide] [AAMAS-10] Call for Demonstrations
Message-ID: <4AE6D957.8020805@iiia.csic.es>

AAMAS 2010 CALL FOR DEMONSTRATIONS

***********************************************************************************
The AAMAS-2010 conference has a especial track on Robotics. 
Demonstrations on  robotics,
particularly with a focus on autonomous robots and multi-robot 
coordination are therefore
encouraged.
***********************************************************************************

You can find this call (and updates) here:
http://www.cse.yorku.ca/AAMAS2010/#content=call4_demo_proposal

AAMAS 2010 will include a demonstration session. The goal of the 
demonstrations is to give
participants, from industry and academia an opportunity to present their 
latest developments
on software and/or robotic systems. In addition, we strongly encourage 
students to submit
valuable demos resulting from their projects or thesis work.

A "Best Demo Award" will be awarded, and will include a cash prize of 
$1,000. The award
selection will be done by the exhibits & demos co-chairs in consultation 
with the
Advisory Board.

Demonstrators are expected to present a live interactive demo at 
assigned time slots during
the conference. Developers of software or robotic systems based on 
autonomous agents or
multi-agent techniques, especially those showing novel technology, are 
especially welcome.
Examples of demos include but are not limited to:

   * Multi-agent software systems
   * Industrial and military applications (including prototypes)
   * Agent-based games
   * Agent platforms and development environments
   * Open-source software tools
-->* Robotic systems (single and multi-agent)
   * Virtual agents and interactive virtual environments
   * Simulation environments

SUBMISSION REQUIREMENTS

Submissions accepted for the demonstration session will be advertised on 
the AAMAS website
and in the conference booklet, which will contain abstracts of all 
available demos. Each
demo submission should consist of a compressed file (*.rar or *.zip 
formats), named as the
first author's surname, and containing the following:

1. Paper: A 2-page paper in which the authors describe the system to be 
demonstrated.
The paper should describe the application domain, the problem scenario, 
the technology used,
the agent/multi-agent techniques involved, the innovations of the 
system, its live and
interactive aspects, etc. Papers must be prepared in PDF format using 
the AAMAS style
(follow the instructions at 
http://www.cse.yorku.ca/AAMAS2010/index.php#content=authors_instructions).
The PDF file of the paper must be named "XXXX.pdf" where XXXX is the 
surname of the
first author.

2. Movie / Demo Plan: The paper must contain a URL link to a 
demonstration movie
(youtube compatible) of a maximum length of 10 minutes. The movie must 
clearly show
how the demo will be performed.

Important: Do not send the video file itself in the compressed 
submission file.

Alternatively, the authors can submit a separate document (within the 
compressed file
described above) that consists of a series of snapshots of the demo 
annotated with an
explanation. This file must be named "demoplan.pdf"

3. Additional information: The compressed file must contain a plain text 
file (named "summary.txt")
including the following information:

* Demonstration title
* Authors (name, affiliation, email, address, phone fax)
* The corresponding author with her/his email address
* Abstract (max. 150 words)
* Keywords
* The category of the submission
* URL (if available)
* Paper ID if the demo is related to a paper at the main conference
* Equipment you will bring (e.g., laptop, robot)
* Equipment you will need (e.g., table, poster board, power sockets)
* Special requirements (e.g., space for robot and if so how much, video 
projector)
* A discussion of the present state of your demo (e.g., ready to 
demonstrate now, but if not,
include a realistic estimate for conclusion and what remains to be done 
before you have a
demonstrable software/robotic system).

4. Contribution and Supervisor Endorsement (student projects only): A 
1-page statement in
which the student clearly describes his personal contribution to the 
project. The content of
the statement must be confirmed by the student's advisor, via a separate 
email, to both Demos Chairs.

Accepted demos will have the 2-page papers included in the AAMAS 
proceedings.

SUBMISSION SITE

All demonstration submissions should be submitted via EasyChair on this 
address (may require
signing up to EasyChair if you do not already have an account):

http://www.easychair.org/conferences/?conf=aamas2010demos

SELECTION PROCESS

The submission and selection processes for the AAMAS 2010 demos will be 
separate from that of
the main conference. Each submission will be assessed by the demo 
co-chairs and at least one
member of the advisory board. The authors will receive a brief report 
with the result of the
evaluation with the notification.

The main evaluation criteria are:

   * Relevance to AAMAS
   * Quality and soundness of the underlying technology
   * Novelty of the application domain
   * Maturity of the (deployed) system
   * Potential for public interaction

Notification of acceptance or rejection of submitted demos will be sent 
to the corresponding
author (see dates below). At least one author of each accepted 
demonstration is required to register
and to attend the conference to give the demonstration.

IMPORTANT DATES

Submission deadline: January 11, 2010.
Notification of acceptance/rejection: January 29, 2010.
Camera-ready paper: February 5, 2010

CONTACT INFORMATION

For more information, contact the demos co-chairs via email.

EXHIBITS & DEMOS ADVISORY BOARD

- Jacob Crandall, Masdar Institute of Science & Technology, UAE
- Partha S Dutta, Rolls-Royce, Singapore
- Andrew Gilpin, Hg Analytics, USA
- Stefan Kopp, Bielefeld University, Germany
- Michael Neff, University of California, Davis, USA
- Pablo Noriega, IIIA, Spain
- Andrea Omicini, Universita di Bologna, Italy
- H. Van Dyke Parunak, NewVectors LLC, USA
- Juan Pav?n, Universidad Complutense Madrid, Spain
- Dave Robertson, University of Edinburgh, UK
- Alex Rogers, University of Southampton, UK
- Onn Shehory, IBM, Israel
- Candy Sidner, Worcester Polytechnic Institute, USA
- Michael Winikoff, University of Otago, New Zealand

(more coming soon)

AAMAS 2010 EXHIBITS & DEMOS CHAIRS

Catherine Pelachaud
CNRS T?l?com ParisTech, France
http://perso.telecom-paristech.fr/~pelachau/

Iyad Rahwan
British University in Dubai, UAE &
University of Edinburgh, UK
http://homepages.inf.ed.ac.uk/irahwan/

 


From gaurav at usc.edu  Fri Oct 30 10:22:52 2009
From: gaurav at usc.edu (Gaurav S. Sukhatme)
Date: Fri, 30 Oct 2009 10:22:52 -0700
Subject: [robotics-worldwide] Autonomous Robots 27(4) TOC [Special issue on
	'Characterizing Mobile Robot Localization and Mapping']
Message-ID: <562c8ffd0910301022y3988a2d7qf1f557e26cd59dc3@mail.gmail.com>

Volume 27 Number 4 of Autonomous Robots (special issue on
Characterizing Mobile Robot Localization and Mapping) is now available
in print and at the SpringerLink website
(http://springerlink.com/content/100243/). SpringerLink allows free
access to all paper abstracts. Full access (PDF) is by individual or
institutional subscription.

Papers in this special issue concern themselves with experimental
methodology, data repositories, toolkits, and algorithms for
benchmarking and evaluation. Collectively, these papers provide public
access to 6 datasets and 3 benchmarking and evaluation toolkits.

Thanks to the guest editors, Raj Madhavan, Chris Scrapper, and Alex
Kleiner for their work in putting this issue together.

-------------------------------------------------------------------
Autonomous Robots 27(4) Table of Contents
-------------------------------------------------------------------

Guest editorial: Special issue on characterizing mobile robot
localization and mapping
Authors(s): Raj Madhavan, Chris Scrapper & Alex Kleiner
DOI: 10.1007/s10514-009-9146-7
pp. 309 - 311

An insightful comparison between experiments in mobile robotics and in
science
Authors(s): Francesco Amigoni, Monica Reggiani & Viola Schiaffonati
DOI: 10.1007/s10514-009-9137-8
pp. 313 - 325

A collection of outdoor robotic datasets with centimeter-accuracy
ground truth
Authors(s): Jose-Luis Blanco, Francisco-Angel Moreno & Javier Gonzalez
DOI: 10.1007/s10514-009-9138-7
pp. 327 - 351

Rawseeds ground truth collection systems for indoor self-localization
and mapping
Authors(s): Simone Ceriani, Giulio Fontana, Alessandro Giusti, Daniele
Marzorati, Matteo Matteucci, Davide Migliore, Davide Rizzi, Domenico
G. Sorrenti & Pierluigi Taddei
DOI: 10.1007/s10514-009-9156-5
pp. 353 - 371

Robust vision-based robot localization using combinations of local
feature region detectors
Authors(s): Arnau Ramisa, Adriana Tapus, David Aldavert, Ricardo
Toledo & Ramon Lopez de Mantaras
DOI: 10.1007/s10514-009-9136-9
pp. 373 - 385

On measuring the accuracy of SLAM algorithms
Authors(s): Rainer K?mmerle, Bastian Steder, Christian Dornhege,
Michael Ruhnke, Giorgio Grisetti, Cyrill Stachniss & Alexander Kleiner
DOI: 10.1007/s10514-009-9155-6
pp. 387 - 407

Iterated D-SLAM map joining: evaluating its performance in terms of
consistency, accuracy and efficiency
Authors(s): Shoudong Huang, Zhan Wang, Gamini Dissanayake & Udo Frese
DOI: 10.1007/s10514-009-9153-8
pp.  409 - 429

Using virtual scans for improved mapping and evaluation
Authors(s): Rolf Lakaemper & Nagesh Adluru
DOI: 10.1007/s10514-009-9149-4
pp. 431 - 448

Evaluating maps produced by urban search and rescue robots: lessons
learned from RoboCup
Authors(s): Benjamin Balaguer, Stephen Balakirsky, Stefano Carpin &
Arnoud Visser
DOI: 10.1007/s10514-009-9141-z
pp. 449 - 464

Performance evaluation of pure-motion tasks for mobile robots with
respect to world models
Authors(s): Daniele Calisi & Daniele Nardi
DOI: 10.1007/s10514-009-9150-y
pp. 465 - 481

-------------------------------------------------------------------
Gaurav S. Sukhatme
Editor-in-Chief
Autonomous Robots
http://robotics.usc.edu/~gaurav

From amenezes at umich.edu  Sat Oct 31 19:31:30 2009
From: amenezes at umich.edu (Amor Menezes)
Date: Sat, 31 Oct 2009 22:31:30 -0400
Subject: [robotics-worldwide] Last CFP: Robotica - "Robotic Self-X Systems,
 " November 9 Extended Deadline
Message-ID: <20091031223130.19895ds9u17eb74s@web.mail.umich.edu>


Call For Papers: Robotica, Cambridge Journals

Special issue on "Robotic Self-X Systems"

Scope:

Self-X systems are systems that are capable of self-assembly,  
self-organization, self-reconfiguration, self-repair,  
self-replication, or self-reproduction.  The past 25 years have seen  
the development of several robotic self-X systems, often inspired by  
John von Neumann's seminal efforts on self-reproducing automata in the  
late 1940s.  The field of Robotic Self-X Systems holds immense promise  
for advances in such diverse areas as autonomous manufacturing,  
bioengineering, evolutionary software, and space colonization.

Theoretical and experimental works in this field of Robotic Self-X  
Systems are invited for a special issue of Robotica.  The issue will  
balance novel papers on the hardware, planning, and control aspects of  
example systems.  One of the strengths of self-X systems is their  
potential ability to respond to uncertain environments and execute a  
variety of tasks.  Hence, contributions that analyze the response of  
robotic self-X systems to partial system failure and uncertain or  
changing environments are especially welcomed.  Technologies that  
allow such systems to operate optimally in the presence of  
uncertainty, adapt to changes in the external environment, and respond  
rapidly to applied disturbances and disruptions to the internal system  
states are important because systems equipped with these advances can  
learn, adapt, evolve, and achieve resiliency to large-scale  
environment or state variations.


Topics of interest include (but are not limited to):

* Morphology variations in self-assembling systems to accomplish  
changing goals.
* System adaptation through repeated self-organization.
* Scalability of hardware and control algorithms in  
self-reconfigurable systems.
* Learning and minimization of module self-repair.
* Self-replication in unstructured environments.
* Evolutionary behaviors that result from self-reproduction.
* Coordination between different types of self-X systems.


Important Dates:

* Submission Deadline (EXTENDED): November 9, 2009
* Review Decision: January 1, 2010
* Final Submission: March 1, 2010
* Expected Publication: May 1, 2010


Submission:

Authors are strongly encouraged to notify the guest editors of their  
intention to submit a paper.  Manuscripts that are submitted to  
Robotica in a single-column double-spaced format should typically be  
40 pages or less, and between 8,000 and 12,000 words.

The journal website is:
http://journals.cambridge.org/action/displayJournal?jid=ROB

The submission website is:
http://mc.manuscriptcentral.com/robotica

Instructions are available at:
http://assets.cambridge.org/ROB/ROB_ifc.pdf


Guest Editors:

Pierre T. Kabamba
kabamba at umich.edu
Aerospace Engineering, University of Michigan


Amor A. Menezes
amenezes at umich.edu
Aerospace Engineering, University of Michigan

From jgu at dal.ca  Fri Oct 30 11:03:34 2009
From: jgu at dal.ca (jason Gu)
Date: Fri, 30 Oct 2009 15:03:34 -0300
Subject: [robotics-worldwide] WCICA 2010 Second Call for Papers
In-Reply-To: <200910301506.n9UF6pPN017201@Gu-c312-Robot.EE.Dal.Ca>
References: <200910301506.n9UF6pPN017201@Gu-c312-Robot.EE.Dal.Ca>
Message-ID: <004e01ca598b$4bf6eb80$b356ad81@gup4c312>

----------------------------------------------------------------------------
       Our apologies if you receive duplicates of this posting.
   Please feel free to distribute it to those who might be interested.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------

****************************************************************************
                            CALL FOR PAPERS                         
                                                                   
                               WCICA 2010
                          http://2010.wcica.info

                                                                   
       The 8th World Congress on Intelligent Control and Automation (WCICA
2010)      
                    Jinan, China, July 7-9, 2010           
****************************************************************************

The 8th World Congress on Intelligent Control and Automation (WCICA 2010)
will take place from July 7 to 9, 2010 in Jinan, China. It is our great
pleasure to invite you to submit your original research papers to the
Congress. 


Subject and Scope
-----------------
WCICA 2010 is intended to provide a common forum for researchers,
scientists, and engineers throughout the world to present their latest
research findings, ideas, developments and applications in the area of
Control and Automation. WCICA 2010 will include keynote addresses by eminent
scientists and Engineers as well as special, oral and poster sessions. 

We are happy to report the confirmation of following world wellknown keynote
speakers:

Prof. Brian D. O. Anderson
FRS,FASS,FIEEE
Distinguished Professor Brian Anderson
Research School of Information Sciences and Engineering,
The Australian National University
Australia

Prof. Rajni Patel, Ph.D., P.Eng. 
FRSC, FIEEE,FEIC
Distinguished University Professor & Tier-1 Canada Research Chair
Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering
University of Western Ontario

Prof. Kazuhiro Kosuge 
FIEEE,FRSJ,FJEME
Department of Bioengineering and Robotics
Tohoku University
Japan

Prof. Hassan K. Khalil 
FIEEE, FIFAC
University Distinguished Professor 
Department of Electrical & Computer Engineering (ECE) 
Michigan State  University  
USA

Prof. Frank L. Lewis
FIEEE, FIFAC, FIMC
University Distinguished Scholar Professor
University of Texas
USA

Prof. Daizhan Cheng
FIEEE, FIFAC
Institute of Systems Science
Chinese Academy of Sciences 
China

All papers will be peer reviewed on the basis of a full length manuscript
and acceptance will be based on quality, originality and relevance. Accepted
papers will be published in the conference proceedings. All accepted papers
in the Proceedings of WCICA 2010 will be published by IEEE and indexed by
EI. WCICA 2010 also provides Best Paper Awards to honor the outstanding
papers presented at this Congress. WCICA 2010 welcomes proposals for
organizing Invited/Special Sessions on the conference topics and Tutorials
and Workshops on emerging topics. Detailed information on paper and proposal
submissions is available on the web:

http://2010.wcica.info

Topics will include, but are not limited to, the following:

A  Intelligent Control and Automation
A1 Intelligent Control Theory and Applications
A2 Computational Intelligence and Applications
A3 Intelligent Automation and Manufacturing
A4 Artificial Intelligence and Knowledge Engineering
A5 Network Intelligence and Network Control

B  Control Theory and Control Engineering
B1 Systems and Control Theory and Applications
B2 Systems Engineering and Engineering Optimization
B3 Advanced Control Algorithms and Applications
B4 Modeling, Identification, and Fault Diagnosis
B5 Industrial Automation and On-line Monitoring

C  Complex Systems and Intelligent Robots
C1 Complex Systems, Logistics, and Supply Chain
C2 Robotics, Service and Medical Robotics
C3 Integrated and Complex Automation Systems
C4 Intelligent Management and Decision Making
C5 Electronic Commerce and Office Automation

D  Others
D1 Measurement Method and Intelligent Instrumentation
D2 Sensors, Sensor Networks, Sensing and Signal Processing
D3 Pattern Recognition, Image Processing, and Machine Vision
D4 Biomedical Engineering and Biosystems Automation
D5 NANO, MEMS, NEMS, and Mechatronics Systems


Important Dates
---------------
Deadline for full paper submission:     November 30, 2009
Notification of accepted papers:        February 28, 2010
Submission of accepted final papers:    March 31, 2010

Paper Submission
----------------
Authors are invited to submit the full manuscript (4 to 6 pages including
references) of their technical paper, for oral or poster presentation.
Papers in pdf format may be uploaded via the web at
https://www.softconf.com/s08/wcica2010 or http://2010.wcica.info

The MS Word, pdf and latex templates are available on the conference
website. Please go to http://2010.wcica.info/  and click Paper Submission
button to download all the templates. Final manuscripts are limited to six
pages.

In submitting a paper, the author(s) agree that, upon acceptance, they will
prepare the final manuscript in time for inclusion in the published
proceedings and will present the paper at the conference. The final
manuscript will not be published without advance registration.


Invited Sessions
----------------
WCICA 2010 solicits invited session proposals. The invited sessions are
intended to stimulate in-depth discussions in special areas relevant to the
conference theme. The session organizers will coordinate the review process
for their session papers. The conference proceedings will include all papers
from the invited sessions. Authors contributing to invited sessions are
required to register for the conference. All invited session proposals
should be sent via email to Prof. Z.P. Jiang at zjiang at control.poly.edu,
before November 30, 2009.  Please check under "Workshop & Org. Sessions" of
the conference webpage: http://2010.wcica.info/ for more information. 


We look forward to meeting you at WCICA 2010 in Jinan, China in July, 2010.

With kindest regards,

WCICA 2010 Organizing Committee
 



From isler at cs.rpi.edu  Wed Oct 28 17:36:54 2009
From: isler at cs.rpi.edu (Volkan Isler)
Date: Wed, 28 Oct 2009 19:36:54 -0500
Subject: [robotics-worldwide] Networked Robots
Message-ID: <4AE8E3A6.2030600@cs.rpi.edu>

On behalf of the IEEE RAS Technical Committee on Networked Robots, it is 
my pleasure to introduce the networked-robots blog:

http://networked-robots.cs.umn.edu/

The goal of the blog is to provide a dynamic, lively forum to share 
information about recent developments in the area. For example, Nikolaus 
Correll just posted an excellent overview of related papers in IROS. 
Other bloggers posted videos and summaries of their ongoing research.

If you are interested in becoming a blogger, you can sign up through:
http://networked-robots.cs.umn.edu/contact

(please use your official/institutional email address).

In addition to our bloggers, anyone can participate through comments. 
For updates, you can subscribe to our RSS Feed.

Best regards,
Volkan

--


Ibrahim Volkan Isler
Assistant Professor of Computer Science
Resident Fellow, Institute on Environment

University of Minnesota
http://www.cs.umn.edu/~isler/
http://rsn.cs.umn.edu/