From Sensing to Collaboration: Engineering, Exploring and Exploiting the Building Blocks of Embodied Intelligence - An EPSRC Programme Grant
Lead Research Organisation:
University of Oxford
Department Name: Engineering Science
Abstract
Our robots are too specialised, too impoverished in their sensing, too uncooperative and too unsafe to be productive at scale. To contribute to productivity in strategically important areas such as social care, manufacturing, logistics, service, inspection or agriculture, future generations of robots need to be able to sense, interpret, act, navigate, coordinate and collaborate with an hitherto unprecedented acuity.
VISION: The overarching aim of this research programme is to deliver autonomous systems which amplify human capacity and potential. These robots must be capable of performing a broad array of bespoke tasks effectively, and with a minimum of operator intervention. In a sustainable national centre of excellence we will grow the technology and people substrate for robust embodied intelligence, i.e. the science and technology to enable robots to robustly and flexibly act, interact and collaborate in the real world.
STRATEGY: Our focus is on engineering, exploring and exploiting the building blocks of integrated embodied intelligence to deliver autonomous systems which, over the course of their life-time, acquire the sensing, perception, manipulation, navigation, collaboration and problem solving abilities required to allow them to operate unaided while significantly enhancing human productivity. We will significantly expand the reach and versatility of robots in domains of strategic and commercial value by exploiting synergies across research disciplines, which only emerge when deploying robot systems. In doing so we are driven by both fundamental science questions and real-world applications. Together with our partners, we have a clear scope in mind: versatile, collaborative robots whose societal and economic footprint is vast. Our work will underpin a national strategic aim with a carefully considered and coherent programme of research: from sensing to collaboration.
VISION: The overarching aim of this research programme is to deliver autonomous systems which amplify human capacity and potential. These robots must be capable of performing a broad array of bespoke tasks effectively, and with a minimum of operator intervention. In a sustainable national centre of excellence we will grow the technology and people substrate for robust embodied intelligence, i.e. the science and technology to enable robots to robustly and flexibly act, interact and collaborate in the real world.
STRATEGY: Our focus is on engineering, exploring and exploiting the building blocks of integrated embodied intelligence to deliver autonomous systems which, over the course of their life-time, acquire the sensing, perception, manipulation, navigation, collaboration and problem solving abilities required to allow them to operate unaided while significantly enhancing human productivity. We will significantly expand the reach and versatility of robots in domains of strategic and commercial value by exploiting synergies across research disciplines, which only emerge when deploying robot systems. In doing so we are driven by both fundamental science questions and real-world applications. Together with our partners, we have a clear scope in mind: versatile, collaborative robots whose societal and economic footprint is vast. Our work will underpin a national strategic aim with a carefully considered and coherent programme of research: from sensing to collaboration.
Planned Impact
Robust, versatile embodied intelligence is crucial for RAS technology contributing to industry and society. It is a pivotal enabler in a number of large industrial sectors in the global economy with an ability to reach a truly vast audience. To realise this potential, it is imperative to combine academic excellence with an appropriate grounding of the research in real industrial need. We run a "petal" impact model. At the heart of the endeavour is research staff surrounded by expert engineering support. Within this team are knowledge exchange engineers and a project delivery coordinator who are charged with managing the flow of knowledge between industry partners and the researchers. Membership to the cadre of industrial partners is offered on a sector-by-sector basis. In this way our proposal will create lasting, catalysing impact on UKPLC.
Industrial Impact - the true impact, reach, ambition and richness of this proposal is best illustrated by some of our research Flagships: domain-specific, physical instantiations of integrated competencies developed across the entire research consortium. Examples include pick-and-carry operations and dressing assistance in Social Care (supported by Oxfordshire County Council and Scan Computers); small-batch, interactive manufacturing tasks (with Accenture, RACE and the Shadow Robot Company); stock-taking, bin picking and bin packing tasks in Logistics (with Ocado and Bossa Nova); precision farming applications (with Saga Robotics); and long-term, multi-agent inspection tasks and autonomous fault intervention (with BP, Navtech L3-ASV and Oxbotica). Our long-term plan is to act as a hub, which serves as a catalyst for investors, existing businesses and new enterprises to inform, engage in and exploit the next generation of RAS technologies.
Academic Impact - the award of a Programme Grant will stimulate the transition of robotics technology from an academic pedigree to real-world applications of industrial significance. It will consolidate and strengthen the UK research base across disciplines such as Robotics, HRI and Cognitive Science.
Societal Impact - we aspire for our robots to work with and alongside us in productive symbiosis - or even care for us. While scientific boundaries are receding, issues surrounding trust and acceptance of this technology into society become ever more apparent. Immediately, then, questions of Responsible Innovation must be asked. The Anticipate-Reflect-Engage-Act) paradigm, as set out by EPSRC, is of course apt here. The Programme Grant will: Anticipate results of related research on the impact of automation on employment; Reflect on and promote ethical thinking around intelligent machines and the societal benefits of interactions between robots and people; Engage with stakeholders and the general public to provide feedback surrounding the effects of our innovation; and Act to test examples of safe and effective human-robot interaction.
Industrial Impact - the true impact, reach, ambition and richness of this proposal is best illustrated by some of our research Flagships: domain-specific, physical instantiations of integrated competencies developed across the entire research consortium. Examples include pick-and-carry operations and dressing assistance in Social Care (supported by Oxfordshire County Council and Scan Computers); small-batch, interactive manufacturing tasks (with Accenture, RACE and the Shadow Robot Company); stock-taking, bin picking and bin packing tasks in Logistics (with Ocado and Bossa Nova); precision farming applications (with Saga Robotics); and long-term, multi-agent inspection tasks and autonomous fault intervention (with BP, Navtech L3-ASV and Oxbotica). Our long-term plan is to act as a hub, which serves as a catalyst for investors, existing businesses and new enterprises to inform, engage in and exploit the next generation of RAS technologies.
Academic Impact - the award of a Programme Grant will stimulate the transition of robotics technology from an academic pedigree to real-world applications of industrial significance. It will consolidate and strengthen the UK research base across disciplines such as Robotics, HRI and Cognitive Science.
Societal Impact - we aspire for our robots to work with and alongside us in productive symbiosis - or even care for us. While scientific boundaries are receding, issues surrounding trust and acceptance of this technology into society become ever more apparent. Immediately, then, questions of Responsible Innovation must be asked. The Anticipate-Reflect-Engage-Act) paradigm, as set out by EPSRC, is of course apt here. The Programme Grant will: Anticipate results of related research on the impact of automation on employment; Reflect on and promote ethical thinking around intelligent machines and the societal benefits of interactions between robots and people; Engage with stakeholders and the general public to provide feedback surrounding the effects of our innovation; and Act to test examples of safe and effective human-robot interaction.
Organisations
- University of Oxford (Lead Research Organisation)
- UNIVERSITY OF OXFORD (Collaboration)
- Accenture (United States) (Project Partner)
- Shadow Robot (United Kingdom) (Project Partner)
- Saga Robotics (International) (Project Partner)
- BP (United Kingdom) (Project Partner)
- Ocado Group (Project Partner)
- CCFE/UKAEA (Project Partner)
- Australian Centre for Robotic Vision (Project Partner)
- ASV (United Kingdom) (Project Partner)
- OXFORDSHIRE COUNTY COUNCIL (Project Partner)
- Honda (Germany) (Project Partner)
- Bossanova (Project Partner)
Publications
Pramatarov G
(2022)
BoxGraph: Semantic Place Recognition and Pose Estimation from 3D LiDAR
Price S
(2022)
The Making of Meaning through Dyadic Haptic Affective Touch
in ACM Transactions on Computer-Human Interaction
Price S
(2022)
Introduction to the Special Issue on Digital Touch: Reshaping Interpersonal Communicative Capacity and Touch Practices
in ACM Transactions on Computer-Human Interaction
Rigter M
(2021)
Risk-Averse Bayes-Adaptive Reinforcement Learning
Rigter M
(2023)
Reward-Free Curricula for Training Robust World Models
Rigter M
(2022)
Planning for Risk-Aversion and Expected Value in MDPs
Rigter M.
(2021)
Risk-Averse Bayes-Adaptive Reinforcement Learning
in Advances in Neural Information Processing Systems
Shorthose O
(2022)
Design of a 3D-Printed Soft Robotic Hand With Integrated Distributed Tactile Sensing
in IEEE Robotics and Automation Letters
Street C
(2023)
Formal Modelling for Multi-Robot Systems Under Uncertainty
in Current Robotics Reports
Suleymanov T
(2021)
The Oxford Road Boundaries Dataset
Tang T
(2023)
Point-based metric and topological localisation between lidar and overhead imagery
in Autonomous Robots
Tang TY
(2021)
Self-supervised learning for using overhead imagery as maps in outdoor range sensor localization.
in The International journal of robotics research
Wagstaff E
(2022)
Universal Approximation of Functions on Sets
in Journal of Machine Learning Research, 23
Wang S
(2023)
A Toolbox for Designing 3D-Printing-Ready Pneumatic Circuits for Controlling Soft Robots
in Advanced Intelligent Systems
Wang S
(2022)
A Magnetorheological Elastomer-Based Proportional Valve for Soft Pneumatic Actuators
in Advanced Intelligent Systems
Wang S
(2022)
A Modular Approach to Design Multi-Channel Bistable Valves for Integrated Pneumatically-Driven Soft Robots via 3D-Printing
in IEEE Robotics and Automation Letters
Wang S
(2022)
Design and Characterization of a 3D-Printed Pneumatically-Driven Bistable Valve With Tunable Characteristics
in IEEE Robotics and Automation Letters
Wu Y
(2024)
DreamUp3D: Object-Centric Generative Models for Single-View 3D Scene Understanding and Real-to-Sim Transfer
in IEEE Robotics and Automation Letters
Zhong F
(2023)
A Sensor Placement Benchmarking Method With Principal Component Analysis
in IEEE Transactions on Instrumentation and Measurement
Zürn J
(2024)
AutoGraph: Predicting Lane Graphs From Traffic Observations
in IEEE Robotics and Automation Letters
Description | 1. The award has made progress in a number of research directions. One key finding is that the latent space induced by deep generative models is smooth and contains enough structure to be able to effectively and robustly perform motion planning. In particular, this means that we can perform gradient-based optimisation in the latent space and from the result trajectory decode valid, real-world robot trajectories. Gradients are provided by constraint predictors (classifiers), which allow task specification at a semantic level, such as collision avoidance requirements, stability requirements, etc. This presents a fundamentally different approach to robot motion planning, which does not come with the performance guarantees of traditional methods, but nevertheless operates an order of magnitude faster than traditional methods. The latest iteration of the work has won a best paper award at the 2023 UK Manipulation Workshop. 2. Recently, the role of touch, which is a crucial aspect of interpersonal communication, has emerged as an important area of social robot research. Understanding the details about how we use touch in healthcare settings can help us understand what aspects are important when designing social robots in this context. Currently, however, very little is known about the role of touch in a clinician-client relationship. Especially, as touch is often reduced to either an (1) instrumental touch, such as a clinician investigating a patient's range of movement through moving their leg, and (2) affective touch, such as tapping on a patient's shoulder to offer comfort. Our work seeks to deepen our understanding of the detailed nuances of touch in interaction. As part of our work, we conducted a systematic literature review on the role of touch in healthcare, and found that touch should be understood to be simultaneously instrumental and affective, even if not yet studied as such in both psychology and robotics literature (Paper in submission). This means that a clinician assessing a patient's range of movement may also convey a feeling of security, trust, or reassurance through their touch. In a subsequent study (paper in preparation) involving twenty-one occupational therapists we investigated how they use touch as part of their practice. Our study revealed several themes demonstrating the complexities of touch in such a context. The results show how instrumental touch is modulated by the affective needs of the patients as well as how this modulation contributes to build patient's trust and confidence in the occupational therapist. In addition, the study reveals how modulation of touch can convey different types of affective messages within instrumental touch. The results from our study highlights the importance to consider affective aspect of tactile interaction when building robots for delivering instrumental touch in the context of care. The results also inform the design of robots to be used as patient-simulators in occupational therapy training sessions, our next step in this work. The approach itself is simple to implement, and described in detail in a number of publications from this award as applied to manipulator and quadrupedal robot motion planning. It can therefore readily be taken forward and put to use by others. 3.A. We designed a soft robotics hand which can be 3D printed and can achieve configurations/postures as a human hand, has distributed sensors to provide sense of touch during manipulation of objects and it is highly adaptable which reduce the need of complex control. Thanks to these capabilities we could successfully classify objects by using only sense of touch. 3.B. We developed a Software (toolbox) to help in the design of soft robotic actuators to achieve desired configurations. Usually, these systems are designed using a trial-and-error approach due to the challenges related to modelling their behaviour because of the infinite degrees of freedoms and non-linearity of the materials. The SW toolbox has been made available to the community. 3.C. Soft robots are usually very soft and adaptable, but they rely on heavy industrial valves which are bulky and rigid, and this limits their deployment in real environments. We developed a method to be able use 3D printing to manufacture soft valves for control of pneumatic soft robots. This allows to integrate them in the robot body and to combine them to achieve computation on board of the robot. This will enable untethered robots which can be deployed in real environment. 3.D. We submitted a review paper about affective touch to understand what has been studied so far in relation to the use of touch for affective communication. This will be used to design robotic systems with the ability to convey emotion through touch or to understand affective communication when touched. This capability will be exploited in the context of Occupational Therapist training. 4. We developed a Congestion-Aware Multi-agent Simulator (CAMAS) which captured the uncertain delays that are experienced when multiple robots share the same physical space when navigating. This tool can be used to simulate the probabilistic interactions between robots and other agents in shared spaces such as warehouses. 5 A. We have found that the utility of data from one deployment scenario in learning to perform tasks in a target scenario can be predicted by simple comparisons of the statistics of activations across the many neurons in a neural network. This has other wide-ranging vision applications, where we ourselves have already put it into action in visual place recognition but also forecast its use in curriculum learning, dataset curation, out-of-distribution detection, etc. 5 B. We have developed a data simulator which can create highly realistic imagery which is totally ground truth aligned. We start with a cookie-cutter map of scene content, sparse "laser" points, and output highly realistic imagery as well as refined depth. This will have important impact in exploring dangerous corner cases and adverse conditions in autonomous driving. 5 C. We have developed a 3D laser representation which can localise extremely robustly while requiring only 3kB per scan. We do this by only keeping track of the objects in the scene. This will have important impact in the scalable autonomous driving. 5 D. We have built a framework which can learn to identify objects in the scene by making use of vast amounts of unlabelled data. Simultaneously, it learns to understand when it is failing. This is critical for the safe deployment of autonomous vehicles in unseen environments or situations. 5 E. We have shown that it is possible to localise on-board laser and radar to satellite images. This will lead to more ubiquitous and cheap autonomous vehicles - as we will not require prior surveying of deployment sites. |
Exploitation Route | Academic publications, however too early to say as the grant is ongoing. |
Sectors | Agriculture, Food and Drink,Healthcare,Manufacturing, including Industrial Biotechology,Transport |
URL | https://embodiedintelligence.web.ox.ac.uk/home |
Description | CAMAS has been used by Accenture Labs to simulate large scale multi-robot interactions as part of a generative design process for warehouse layouts and the optimisation of the distribution of human and robot workers within these warehouses. |
First Year Of Impact | 2022 |
Sector | Financial Services, and Management Consultancy |
Impact Types | Economic |
Description | Metacognition in robotics |
Organisation | University of Oxford |
Department | Oxford Robotics Institute (ORI) |
Country | United Kingdom |
Sector | Academic/University |
PI Contribution | Developing measures and models of metacognition in human-machine interactions, and evaluating their impact on trust and collaboration. |
Collaborator Contribution | Expertise and research platforms (both physical and in software) related to robotics and human-machine interaction |
Impact | Outputs in progress |
Start Year | 2021 |
Description | ARA Symposium |
Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | National |
Primary Audience | Industry/Business |
Results and Impact | ARA Symposium |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2021 |
Description | Academic Executive Board - Embodied Intelligence - May 2021 |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A formal working group, expert panel or dialogue |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | National |
Primary Audience | Industry/Business |
Results and Impact | Academic Executive Board - Embodied Intelligence |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2021 |
Description | Amazon Research Award Symposium |
Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | National |
Primary Audience | Industry/Business |
Results and Impact | Amazon Research Award Symposium |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2021 |
Description | Attended MARS 2022 Conference |
Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | International |
Primary Audience | Industry/Business |
Results and Impact | Attended MARS 2022 Conference at Amazon |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2022 |
Description | Attended Oxford Human-Machine Collaboration Conference |
Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | International |
Primary Audience | Industry/Business |
Results and Impact | Attended Oxford Human-Machine Collaboration Conference |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2022 |
Description | CDL-Oxford (AI) Session |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A formal working group, expert panel or dialogue |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | National |
Primary Audience | Industry/Business |
Results and Impact | CDL-Oxford (AI) Session |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2021 |
Description | ECMR 2021 - invitation for a keynote speech |
Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | International |
Primary Audience | Industry/Business |
Results and Impact | ECMR 2021 - invitation for a keynote speech |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2021 |
Description | EPSRC IAA Steering Group meeting |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A formal working group, expert panel or dialogue |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | National |
Primary Audience | Industry/Business |
Results and Impact | EPSRC IAA Steering Group meeting |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2021 |
Description | Fosun conversation ongoing |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A formal working group, expert panel or dialogue |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | National |
Primary Audience | Industry/Business |
Results and Impact | Fosun conversation ongoing |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2021 |
Description | IBM-Oxford collaboration |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A formal working group, expert panel or dialogue |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | National |
Primary Audience | Industry/Business |
Results and Impact | Discuss collaboration |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2021 |
Description | IROS Conference |
Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | International |
Primary Audience | Public/other audiences |
Results and Impact | IROS Conference |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2021 |
Description | IT Committee |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A formal working group, expert panel or dialogue |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | Local |
Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
Results and Impact | IT Committee |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2021 |
Description | Invited Talk: Pavel Izmailov on What Bayesian Neural Network Posteriors Really Are Like |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | National |
Primary Audience | Industry/Business |
Results and Impact | Invited Talk: Pavel Izmailov on What Bayesian Neural Network Posteriors Really Are Like |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2021 |
Description | Jan 2023: Ingmar gave invited talk at Imperial College Robot Learning Lab |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | National |
Primary Audience | Postgraduate students |
Results and Impact | • Jan 2023: HIP gave invited talk at Imperial College Robot Learning Lab |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2023 |
Description | NVIDIA potentially interested in closely related project |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A formal working group, expert panel or dialogue |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | National |
Primary Audience | Industry/Business |
Results and Impact | NVIDIA potentially interested in closely related project |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2021 |
Description | Newspaper article in Financial Times |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A magazine, newsletter or online publication |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | International |
Primary Audience | Public/other audiences |
Results and Impact | Article in Financial Times magazine on the potential for metacognition in AI |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2021 |
URL | https://www.ft.com/content/1ff66eb9-166f-4082-958f-debe84e92e9e |
Description | Oxford Robotics Institute visit to the MTC |
Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | International |
Primary Audience | Industry/Business |
Results and Impact | Oxford Robotics Institute visit to the MTC |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2022 |
Description | Panel Member - ELLIS PhD & Postdoc Summit |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A formal working group, expert panel or dialogue |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | National |
Primary Audience | Industry/Business |
Results and Impact | Panel Member - ELLIS PhD & Postdoc Summit |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2021 |
Description | Pembroke Investment Committee |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A formal working group, expert panel or dialogue |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | National |
Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
Results and Impact | Pembroke Investment Committee |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2021 |
Description | Presentation at Children, Interaction, and Design event |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | National |
Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
Results and Impact | MN gave a presentation at Children, Interaction, and Design networking event in Edinburgh, Scotland. About 100 people from different parts of the UK, with interest and/or background in interaction design with/for children, attended this event. The presentation sparked conversation about future directions of interaction design with children and emerging technologies may support children's development and learning both in formal and informal settings. There was an invitation to join this network where members collaborate on writing grants and meet for knowledge exchange and other related events. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2023 |
URL | https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/children-interaction-and-design-networking-event-tickets-504606921887 |
Description | Presentation at UCL Robotics Workshop '23 |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | Regional |
Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
Results and Impact | MN and LH gave a presentation and presented a poster at UCL Robotics Workshop 2023 with the title "How understanding the role of instrumental-affective touch in occupational therapy practice may support the development of collaborative robots in healthcare". About two hundred people attended the event. The presentation sparked conversations especially around trust and touch in clinician-patient interaction. In addition, audience members reported interest in themes reported, and an understanding the importance of instrumental-affective touch in human-robotic interaction, as well as acknowledging how this type of understanding of touch may support in designing social robots in healthcare settings. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2023 |
URL | https://www.ucl.ac.uk/robotics/events/2023/feb/ucl-robotics-23 |
Description | Presentation at the Association for the Advancement of Affective Computing |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | International |
Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
Results and Impact | NB gave an online seminar presentation for the Association for the Advancement of Affective Computing (AAAC) titled "Movement, Touch and Affective Technology: Opportunities in Physical Rehabilitation" reaching an international professional audience with shared interest in affective computing. The presentation sparked conversation afterwards about opportunities to investigate touch in social robotics and exploring future research collaboration. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2023 |
URL | https://aaac.world/association/ |
Description | Speak at CDT Joint Conference |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | National |
Primary Audience | Undergraduate students |
Results and Impact | Speak at CDT Joint Conference |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2021 |
Description | Speaks at David Filliat's w/s |
Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | National |
Primary Audience | Public/other audiences |
Results and Impact | speaks at David Filliat's w/s |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2021 |
Description | Talk at MORE |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | National |
Primary Audience | Industry/Business |
Results and Impact | Gives MORE talk |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2021 |
Description | Workshops with Occupational Therapists |
Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | Regional |
Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
Results and Impact | Two workshops facilitated by researchers, conducted with practicing occupational therapists and their trainers, to explore how therapists use touch as part of their practice, and what types of affect is conveyed through different type of touch during seating assessment or moving and handling of patient. The workshops also sparked conversations around opportunities and challenges of designing and incorporating social robots to occupational training, or working alongside therapists. The participating therapists were keen to continue collaborating in future workshops and research with similar themes. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2022 |
Description | invited to advisory board on Awareness Inside track EU proposal |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A formal working group, expert panel or dialogue |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | National |
Primary Audience | Industry/Business |
Results and Impact | invited to advisory board on Awareness Inside track EU proposal |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2021 |
Description | involved in scoping project with IBM for DARPA project on introspective control |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A formal working group, expert panel or dialogue |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | National |
Primary Audience | Industry/Business |
Results and Impact | involved in scoping project with IBM for DARPA project on introspective control |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2021 |
Description | part of a potential partner-centre bid to the Australian Research Council. Remit of the centre similar to ours. Underlines topicality and reach of what we are doing here. |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A formal working group, expert panel or dialogue |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | National |
Primary Audience | Industry/Business |
Results and Impact | part of a potential partner-centre bid to the Australian Research Council. Remit of the centre similar to ours. Underlines topicality and reach of what we are doing here. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2021 |
Description | • 12th April 2022: NH talk invited talk to Edinburgh Centre for Robotics |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | International |
Primary Audience | Industry/Business |
Results and Impact | • 12th April 2022: NH talk invited talk to Edinburgh Centre for Robotics |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2022 |
Description | • 12th Jan 2022: NH gave invited seminar to University of Manchester |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | National |
Primary Audience | Postgraduate students |
Results and Impact | • 12th Jan 2022: NH gave invited seminar to University of Manchester |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2022 |
Description | • 12th Nov 2021: NH gave invited seminar to AIMS CDT |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | National |
Primary Audience | Undergraduate students |
Results and Impact | • 12th Nov 2021: NH gave invited seminar to AIMS CDT |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2022 |
Description | • 14th June 2022: NH invited talk at the KTH RPL Summer School in Sweden. |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | International |
Primary Audience | Schools |
Results and Impact | • 14th June 2022: NH invited talk at the KTH RPL Summer School in Sweden. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2022 |
Description | • 17 November 2022: All groups involved in PG delivered talks at Bristol symposium organised by this PG. |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | International |
Primary Audience | Industry/Business |
Results and Impact | • 17 November 2022: All groups involved in PG delivered talks at Bristol symposium organised by this PG. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2022 |
Description | • 17 November 2022: PG/ORI visit to BRL, effectively a small symposium for knowledge exchange and to explore overlap. |
Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | International |
Primary Audience | Industry/Business |
Results and Impact | • 17 November 2022: PG/ORI visit to BRL, effectively a small symposium for knowledge exchange and to explore overlap. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2022 |
Description | • 22nd June 2022: NH invited talk at AgriForwards CDT conference in Lincoln. |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | International |
Primary Audience | Industry/Business |
Results and Impact | • 22nd June 2022: NH invited talk at AgriForwards CDT conference in Lincoln. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2022 |
Description | • 24th Feb 2022: NH invited talk to Beijing Institute of Technology |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | International |
Primary Audience | Industry/Business |
Results and Impact | • 24th Feb 2022: NH invited talk to Beijing Institute of Technology |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2022 |
Description | • 26-30 September 2022: NH participated at Dagstuhl on Cognitive Robotics |
Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | International |
Primary Audience | Industry/Business |
Results and Impact | • 26-30 September 2022: NH participated at Dagstuhl on Cognitive Robotics |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2022 |
Description | • 27 May: HIP give invited talk at ICRA w/s on Releasing Robots into the Wild. |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | International |
Primary Audience | Industry/Business |
Results and Impact | • 27 May: HIP give invited talk at ICRA w/s on Releasing Robots into the Wild. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2022 |
Description | • 28th April 2022: HIP + NH talks to the Human Machine Collorabtion Conference at Oxford (internal industry-facing event) |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | International |
Primary Audience | Industry/Business |
Results and Impact | • 28th April 2022: HIP + NH talks to the Human Machine Collorabtion Conference at Oxford (internal industry-facing event) |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2022 |
Description | • 28th May 2022: NH, HIP delivered talks on human-machine collaboration at a large AWS-sponsored conference in Oxford |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | International |
Primary Audience | Industry/Business |
Results and Impact | • 28th May 2022: NH, HIP delivered talks on human-machine collaboration at a large AWS-sponsored conference in Oxford |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2022 |
Description | • 28th May 2022: NH/HIP AWS Human-Machine Collaboration Conference |
Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | International |
Primary Audience | Industry/Business |
Results and Impact | • 28th May 2022: NH/HIP AWS Human-Machine Collaboration |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2022 |
Description | • 3 Sep 2021: HIP gave keynote at ECMR 2021 |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | International |
Primary Audience | Industry/Business |
Results and Impact | • 3 Sep 2021: HIP gave keynote at ECMR 2021 |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2022 |
Description | • Dec 2021: HIP/SF/OPJ together with IBM and others organised NeurIPS w/s on Metacognition in the Age of AI |
Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | International |
Primary Audience | Industry/Business |
Results and Impact | • Dec 2021: HIP/SF/OPJ together with IBM and others organised NeurIPS w/s on Metacognition in the Age of AI |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2022 |
Description | • Jan 2023: HIP and PM delivered invited talks at UK Manipulation W/S |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | International |
Primary Audience | Industry/Business |
Results and Impact | • Jan 2023: HIP and PM delivered invited talks at UK Manipulation W/S |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2023 |
Description | • Jan 2023: HIP gave invited talk at HEIBRiDs Berlin |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | International |
Primary Audience | Industry/Business |
Results and Impact | • Jan 2023: HIP gave invited talk at HEIBRiDs Berlin |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2023 |
Description | • Jan 2023: HIP gave invited talk for TU Berlin Science of Intelligence Seminar Series |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | International |
Primary Audience | Industry/Business |
Results and Impact | • Jan 2023: HIP gave invited talk for TU Berlin Science of Intelligence Seminar Series |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2023 |
Description | • October 2022: HIP delivered invited talk at IROS w/s on Probabilistic Robotics in Age of Deep Learning |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | International |
Primary Audience | Industry/Business |
Results and Impact | • October 2022: HIP delivered invited talk at IROS w/s on Probabilistic Robotics in Age of Deep Learning |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2022 |