Plenary Lecture

A Framework for Physical Interaction and its Execution based on Multiple Sensors

Professor Angel P. del Pobil
Professor, Department of Engineering and Computer Science
Director, UJI Robotic Intelligence Laboratory
Universitat Jaume-I
Castellon, Spain
WCU Visiting Professor
Department of Interaction Science, Sungkyunkwan University, Seoul, Korea
E-mail: pobil@icc.uji.es

Abstract: Autonomous robot manipulation is one of the most important challenges in robotics. It involves three challenges: versatility, defined as the capability to adapt to different situations, instead of being limited to a particular task; autonomy, that concerns the level of independence in the robot operation, and dependability, that refers to the capability of successfully completing an action even under important modeling errors or inaccurate sensor information. A complete manipulation task involves two sequential actions: that of achieving a suitable grasp or contact configuration, and the subsequent motion required by the task. We propose a unified framework with the introduction of task-related aspects into the classical knowledge-based grasp concept, leading to task-oriented grasps. In a similar manner, grasp-related issues are also considered during the execution of a task, leading to grasp-oriented tasks. We call this unified representation physical interaction. In the talk I will first present a theoretical framework for the integrated specification of physical interaction tasks, supporting a great variety of actions. Next, the problem of autonomous planning of physical interaction tasks will be addressed. I will then focus on the dependable execution of these tasks, and adopt a sensor-based approach with three different types of sensor feedback: force, vision and tactile. The methods proposed provide important advances with respect to the state-of-the-art versatility, autonomy and dependability of robotic manipulation, allowing to address a wide range of tasks. All these contributions are validated with several experiments using different real robots placed on household environments.
The talk will be based on my latest book titled Robot Physical Interaction through the combination of Vision, Tactile and Force Feedback: Applications to Assistive Robotics, to be published in the Springer Tracts in Advanced Robotics (STAR) series, co-authored by Mario Prats and Pedro J. Sanz. This research was recipient of various awards, including the Georges Giralt European Award and the Robotdalen Scientific Award Honorary Mention.

Brief Biography of the Speaker:
Angel Pasqual del Pobil is Professor of Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence at Jaume I University (Spain), founder director of the UJI Robotic Intelligence Laboratory, and a WCU Visiting Professor at Sungkyungkwan University (Korea). He holds a B.S. in Physics (1986) and a Ph.D. in Engineering (1991), both from the University of Navarra. His Ph.D. Thesis was the winner of the National Award of the Spanish Royal Academy of Doctors. He has been Co-Chair of two Technical Committees of the IEEE Robotics and Automation Society, he is Board member of EURON, the European Robotics Research Network, since 2001 and he has been Vice President of the International Society of Applied Intelligence. He has over 200 refereed publications, including ten books.
Prof. del Pobil was organizer of some 37 workshops and tutorials at ICRA, IROS, RSS, HRI and other major conferences. He was Program Co-Chair of the 11th International Conference on Industrial and Engineering Applications of Artificial Intelligence, and General Chair of five editions of the International Conference on Artificial Intelligence and Soft Computing (2004-2008). He is Associate Editor for ICRA (2009-2011) and IROS (2007-2011) and has served on the program committees of over 100 international conferences. His research interests include: humanoid and service robots, multimodal sensorimotor transformations, robot physical and human interaction, robot learning, and the interplay between neurobiology and robotics. Professor del Pobil has been invited speaker of 49 tutorials, plenary talks, and seminars in 14 countries.