Join author Lee Gutkind in 5700 Wean Hall at 3:30 p.m., Tuesday, Feb. 27, for a book signing and presentation on "Almost Human, Making Robots Think," a new book about the people and projects at Carnegie Mellon's Robotics Institute, to be published March 19 by W.W. Norton & Co.

The book focuses on five characters- Computer Science Professor Manuela Veloso, Associate Research Professor David Wettergreen, Robotics Professor William "Red" Whittaker, Biological Sciences Professor Alan Waggoner and Nathalie Cabrol, a scientist with NASA's Ames Research Center, plus dozens of other RI faculty, students and staff members. Gutkind spent four years in the bowels of the Robotics Institute, observing its inhabitants, attending their meetings, and traveling to odd places to view the progress of their research. He discovered that few obstacles are too great for our enterprising graduate students to overcome.

Gutkind is a professor of English at the University of Pittsburgh who fathered the genre of creative non-fiction. He has written books about organ transplantation, pediatrics, veterinary medicine, baseball umpires and the tragedy of childhood mental illness. He is founder and editor of the journal Creative Nonfiction.

"Almost Human" has been reviewed by Publisher's Weekly and Kirkus Reviews, which gave it a starred review on Dec. 1, 2006. Gutkind will discuss his book on NPR's Talk of the Nation Tuesday, March 20 and make an appearance with Grace, Carnegie Mellon's social robot, at Joseph Beth Booksellers at the Southside Works that same evening.

For more, see at http://www.leegutkind.com