Calendar

Oct
27
Wed
LCSR Seminar: LCSR Faculty “Interviewing for Jobs in Academia and Industry” @ https://wse.zoom.us/s/94623801186
Oct 27 @ 12:00 pm – 1:00 pm

Link for Live Seminar

Link for Recorded seminars – 2021/2022 school year

 

LCSR Faculty “Interviewing for Jobs in Academia and Industry”

 

Speakers: Louis Whitcomb, Marin Kobilarov, and the LCSR Faculty

Abstract:
This LCSR professional development seminar will review the process of interviewing for jobs in academia (e.g. faculty, post-doc, and scientist positions) and industry (e.g. engineering, scientist, and management positions), and will provide tips and best-practices for successful interviewing.

 

Nov
3
Wed
LCSR Seminar: Kel Guerin “Building an End-User Focused Operating System for Robotics” @ https://wse.zoom.us/s/94623801186
Nov 3 @ 12:00 pm – 1:00 pm

Link for Live Seminar

Link for Recorded seminars – 2021/2022 school year

 

Abstract:

There are more than 2 million industrial robots used worldwide every day, and yet these devices represent one of the most fragmented technologies in the world. With more than 100 brands of industrial robots, each with their own proprietary, difficult to learn software and programming languages, we are not seeing the exponential growth we expected out of robots. The computer industry faced a similar challenge in the early 1980s with the advent of the PC, and computers did not see explosive growth until a few key platforms emerged that focused on making computers accessible to end users, and run on a common software platform. At READY robotics, we believe the same is true for robots, and that is why we are building Forge/OS, our “Windows” for the robotics space that lets every robot speak the same language and provide the same award winning user experience to end-users. We will talk about how this technology came about, how we think it can change the future, and discuss the journey from the initial research performed at Johns Hopkins University up to today.

 

Biography:

Kel Guerin has been working in the robotics space for more than 10 years, focusing on the design and usability of a wide variety of robots, including systems for space exploration, deep mining, surgery, and industrial manufacturing. While obtaining his Ph.D. from Johns Hopkins University (Defended 2016), Kel worked specifically on the challenge of making industrial robots more flexible and easy to use. The result was his award-winning Forge Operating System and easy-to-use programming interface for industrial robots. Kel spun out his technology into READY Robotics, an industrial robotics start-up he co-founded in 2016. His work has been featured in the Wall Street Journal, Forbes, and READY’s products have been called “the Swiss Army knife of robots” by Inc. magazine.

Nov
10
Wed
LCSR Seminar: Maya Cakmak @ https://wse.zoom.us/s/94623801186
Nov 10 @ 12:00 pm – 1:00 pm
Nov
17
Wed
LCSR Seminar: Alaa Eldin Abdelaal “An “Additional View” on Human-Robot Interaction and Autonomy in Robot-Assisted Surgery” @ https://wse.zoom.us/s/94623801186
Nov 17 @ 12:00 pm – 1:00 pm

Link for Live Seminar

Link for Recorded seminars – 2021/2022 school year

 

Abstract:

Robot-assisted surgery (RAS) has gained momentum over the last few decades with nearly 1,200,000 RAS procedures performed in 2019 alone using the da Vinci Surgical System, the most widely used surgical robotics platform. The current state-of-the-art surgical robotic systems use only a single endoscope to view the surgical field. In this talk, we present a novel design of an additional “pickup” camera that can be integrated into the da Vinci Surgical System. We then explore the benefits of our design for human-robot interaction (HRI) and autonomy in RAS. On the HRI side, we show how this “pickup” camera improves depth perception as well as how its additional view can lead to better surgical training. On the autonomy side, we show how automating the motion of this camera provides better visualization of the surgical scene. Finally, we show how this automation work inspires the design of novel execution models of the automation of surgical subtasks, leading to superhuman performance.

 

Biography:

Alaa Eldin Abdelaal is a PhD candidate at the Robotics and Control Laboratory at the University of British Columbia and a visiting graduate scholar at the Computational Interaction and Robotics Lab at Johns Hopkins University. He holds a B.Sc. in Computer and Systems Engineering from Mansoura University in Egypt and a M.Sc. in Computing Science from Simon Fraser University in Canada. His research interests are at the intersection of autonomy and human-robot interaction for human skill augmentation and decision support with application to surgical robotics. His work is co-advised by Dr. Tim Salcudean and Dr. Gregory Hager. His research has been recognized with the Best Bench-to-Bedside Paper Award at the International Conference on Information Processing in Computer-Assisted Interventions (IPCAI) 2019. He is the recipient of the Vanier Canada Graduate Scholarship, the most prestigious scholarship for PhD students in Canada.

Dec
1
Wed
LCSR Seminar: LCSR Faculty “Panel on commercialization of robotics research” @ https://wse.zoom.us/s/94623801186
Dec 1 @ 12:00 pm – 1:00 pm

Link for Live Seminar

Link for Recorded seminars – 2021/2022 school year

 

 

Abstract:

In this seminar, we will have a panel of three LCSR faculty, Dr. Peter Kazanzides, Dr. Marin Kobilarov, and Dr. Axel Krieger discussing their experience in commercializing robotic research through licensing and start-up. The panel will include questions and answer sessions with the audience.

 

Jan
26
Wed
LCSR Seminar: Tomas Lozano-Perez “Generalization in Planning and Learning for Robotic Manipulation” @ https://wse.zoom.us/s/94623801186
Jan 26 @ 12:00 pm – 1:00 pm

Link for Live Seminar

Link for Recorded seminars – 2021/2022 school year

 

Abstract:

An enduring goal of AI and robotics has been to build a robot capable of robustly performing a wide variety of tasks in a wide variety of environments; not by sequentially being programmed (or taught) to perform one task in one environment at a time, but rather by intelligently choosing appropriate actions for whatever task and
environment it is facing. This goal remains a challenge. In this talk I’ll describe recent work in our lab aimed at the goal of general-purpose robot manipulation by integrating task-and-motion planning with various forms of model learning. In particular, I’ll describe approaches to manipulating objects without prior shape models, to acquiring composable sensorimotor skills, and to exploiting past experience for more efficient planning.

 

Biography:

Tomas Lozano-Perez is professor in EECS at MIT, and a member of CSAIL. He was a recipient of the 2011 IEEE Robotics Pioneer Award and a co-recipient of the 2021 IEEE Robotics and Automation Technical Field Award. He is a Fellow of the AAAI, ACM, and
IEEE.

Feb
2
Wed
LCSR Seminar: Xuesu Xiao “Deployable Robots that Learn” @ https://wse.zoom.us/s/94623801186
Feb 2 @ 12:00 pm – 1:00 pm

Link for Live Seminar

Link for Recorded seminars – 2021/2022 school year

 

Abstract:

While many robots are currently deployable in factories, warehouses, and homes, their autonomous deployment requires either the deployment environments to be highly controlled, or the deployment to only entail executing one single preprogrammed task. These deployable robots do not learn to address changes and to improve performance. For uncontrolled environments and for novel tasks, current robots must seek help from highly skilled robot operators for teleoperated (not autonomous) deployment.

 

In this talk, I will present two approaches to removing these limitations by learning to enable autonomous deployment in the context of mobile robot navigation, a common core capability for deployable robots: (1) Adaptive Planner Parameter Learning utilizes existing motion planners, fine-tunes these systems using simple interactions with non-expert users before autonomous deployment, adapts to different deployment environments, and produces robust autonomous navigation; (2) Learning from Hallucination enables agile navigation in highly-constrained deployment environments by exploring in a completely safe training environment and creating synthetic obstacle configurations to learn from. Building on robust autonomous navigation, I will discuss my vision toward a hardened, reliable, and resilient robot fleet which is also task-efficient and continually learns from each other and from humans.

 

Biography:

Xuesu Xiao is an incoming Assistant Professor in the Department of Computer Science at George Mason University starting Fall 2022. Currently, he is a roboticist on The Everyday Robot Project at X, The Moonshot Factory, and a research affiliate in the Department of Computer Science at The University of Texas at Austin. Dr. Xiao’s research focuses on field robotics, motion planning, and machine learning. He develops highly capable and intelligent mobile robots that are robustly deployable in the real world with minimal human supervision. Dr. Xiao received his Ph.D. in Computer Science from Texas A&M University in 2019, Master of Science in Mechanical Engineering from Carnegie Mellon University in 2015, and dual Bachelor of Engineering in Mechatronics Engineering from Tongji University and FH Aachen University of Applied Sciences in 2013.

Feb
9
Wed
LCSR Seminar: Terry Peters “A journey in Image-guided Intervention” @ https://wse.zoom.us/s/94623801186
Feb 9 @ 12:00 pm – 1:00 pm

Link for Live Seminar

Link for Recorded seminars – 2021/2022 school year

 

Abstract:

This presentation overviews a number of the projects related to image-guided intervention that have taken place in my lab at the Robarts Research Institute at Western University in recent years. Projects cover applications in Image-guided Neurosurgery, Cardiac surgery, as well as the role of simulation phantoms and  technologies as motion magnification and  mixed reality in image-guided interventions.

 

Biography:

Dr. Terry Peters is a Scientist in the Imaging Research Laboratories at the Robarts Research Institute, London, ON, Canada, and is Professor Emeritus in the Departments of Medical Imaging and Medical Biophysics, and the School of Biomedical Engineering, at Western University. He obtained his PhD in Electrical Engineering at the University of Canterbury in Christchurch NZ,  in the field image reconstruction for CT in 1974, and following some time as a Medical Physicist at the Christchurch Hospital,   joined the Montreal Neurological Institute at McGill University as a research scientist in 1978.  In 1997 he joined the Imaging Research Labs at the Robarts Research Institute at Western University in London Canada, where he expanded his research focus to encompass image-guided procedures in multiple organ systems.  He has authored over 350 peer-reviewed papers, books  and book chapters, and has mentored over 100  trainees. Dr Peters is a Fellow of several academic and professional societies including the IEEE, the MICCAI Society, the Royal Society of Canada.

Feb
16
Wed
LCSR Seminar: Mark Savage (Life Design Educator) “Skills” @ https://wse.zoom.us/s/94623801186
Feb 16 @ 12:00 pm – 1:00 pm

Link for Live Seminar

Link for Recorded seminars – 2021/2022 school year

 

How many skills do think you have?  Mark Savage, Life Design Educator for Engineering Masters Students will explain how the truth may far exceed your estimate.  Knowing,  understanding, and communicating your major skills will prove useful as you pursue jobs and internships.

 

Feb
23
Wed
LCSR Seminar: Ahmed Ghazi “Enhancing Surgical Robotic Innovations through the integration of Novel Simulation Technologies” @ https://wse.zoom.us/s/94623801186
Feb 23 @ 12:00 pm – 1:00 pm

Link for Live Seminar

Link for Recorded seminars – 2021/2022 school year

 

Abstract:

TBA

 

Biography:

Dr. Ghazi MD, FEBU, MHPE, received his medical education from Cairo University, Egypt in 2000, where he also completed his Urology residency 2001-2005. He completed a series of fellowships in minimal invasive Urological surgery, in Paris and Austria (2009-2011), where he received accreditation from the European Board of Urology. He completed an Endourology and robotic surgery fellowship at the University of Rochester Medical Center, New York (2011-2013), after which was appointed Assistant professor of Urology at the University of Rochester (2013).

Dr. Ghazi specializes in the diagnosis and minimal invasive treatment of urological cancers as well as complex stone disease. In addition he perused research grants in education, simulation research and surgical training. To enhance his educational background, he was awarded the George Corner Deans Teaching fellowship (2014-2016), completed the Harvard Macy Institute program for Educators in Health Professions in 2016 and a Masters in Health Professions Education program at the Warner School of Education, University of Rochester (2016-2020). He is currently enrolled in a 2-year Senior Leadership Education and Development Program at the University of Rochester.