Carnegie Mellon Will Induct Four Robots Into Newly Established Robot Hall of Fame

Byron SpiceMonday, October 27, 2003

PITTSBURGH-Carnegie Mellon University will induct four robots into its newly established Robot Hall of Fameā„¢ in a ceremony at Pittsburgh's Carnegie Science Center at 8 p.m. Monday, November 10.

The robots to be honored fall into two categories-robots from science and robots from science fiction. Their creators or others with a close relationship to the robots will attend the ceremony to accept a certificate in their honor.

The Robot Hall of Fame was established earlier this year to honor noteworthy robots, both real and fictional, along with their creators in recognition of the increasing benefits robots are bringing to society.

A Robot Hall of Fame Web site will be unveiled at the induction ceremony. The goal is to create a permanent, interactive exhibition involving robots that will educate and entertain a wide variety of audiences.

A panel of experts, each serving for a two-year term, will choose robots in each category to be inducted into the Hall of Fame. The first panel includes:

  1. Minoru Asada, professor of engineering, Osaka University, Japan, and founder of the International RoboCup Federation.
  2. Rodney Brooks, director, Massachusetts Institute of Technology Artificial Intelligence Laboratory and author of "Flesh and Machines."
  3. Ellsworth Brown, president, Carnegie Museums of Pittsburgh.
  4. Ruzena Bajcsy, director, Center for Information Technology Research in the Interest of Society (CITRIS), University of California at Berkeley.
  5. Arthur C. Clarke, science fiction writer, futurist and author (with Stanley Kubrick) of "2001."
  6. Henrik Christensen, computer science professor and director, Centre for Autonomous Systems, Royal Institute of Technology, KTH Stockholm, Sweden.
  7. Ray Jarvis, director, Intelligent Robotics Research Centre, Monash University, Melbourne, Australia.
  8. Donald Marinelli, professor of drama and co-director, Entertainment Technology Center, Carnegie Mellon.
  9. James H. Morris, dean, School of Computer Science, Carnegie Mellon, assembled and moderated the panel of experts.
  10. Raj Reddy, Simon University Professor and founder of the Robotics Institute, Carnegie Mellon.
  11. Charles Thorpe, director, Robotics Institute, Carnegie Mellon.
  12. Sherry Turkle, director, Massachusetts Institute of Technology Initiative on Technology and Self.
  13. Will Wright, creator of SimCity, a popular video game environment that features robots.
The next selection of robots for induction into the Robot Hall of Fame is scheduled to take place in conjunction with the 25th anniversary celebration of Carnegie Mellon's Robotics Institute, Oct. 13-16, 2004.

For More Information

Byron Spice | 412-268-9068 | bspice@cs.cmu.edu