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Spring 1998 Schedule

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Self-reconfiguring Robotics

Daniela Rus
Department of Computer Science
Dartmouth College
(On sabbatical at Carnegie Mellon University)

Place and Time
Adamson Wing, Baker Hall
Refreshments 3:15 pm
Talk 3:30 pm

Abstract
Our vision is to create versatile robots by using self-reconfiguration: hundreds of small modules will autonomously organize and reorganize as geometric structures to best fit the terrain on which the robot has to move, the shape of the object the robot has to manipulate, or the sensing needs for the given task. Large collections of small robots will actively organize as the most optimal geometric structure to perform useful coordinated work.

A self-reconfiguring robot consists of a set of identical modules that can dynamically and autonomously reconfigure in a variety of shapes, to best fit the terrain, environment, and task. Self-reconfiguration leads to versatile robots that can support multiple modalities of locomotion and manipulation.

In this talk I will describe the robotic molecule, a module capable of self-reconfiguration in three dimensions and I will talk about planning and control algorithms for this class of robots.

Speaker Biography
Daniela Rus is an assistant professor in the Computer Science Department at Dartmouth, where she founded and directs the Dartmouth Robotics Laboratory. She also co-founded and co-directs the Transportable Agents Laboratory and the Dartmouth Center for Mobile Computing. Previously, she was a research associate and director of the Information Capture and Access project at Cornell University. She holds a PhD degree in computer science form Cornell University. Her research interests include distributed manipulation, 3d navigation, self-reconfiguring robotics, mobile agents, and information organization. She holds an NSF Career award and a Sloan award.

Speaker Appointments
For appointments, please contact the host, Mike Erdmann*, at me@cs.cmu.edu.