Colin Angle guides the strategic direction of the company. Mr. Angle is a true pioneer in the field of mobile robots, designing the behavior-controlled rovers for NASA that led to the Sojourner exploring Mars in 1997. But more importantly Mr. Angle has pioneered business models and relationships responsible for the introduction of multiple commercially viable robotic products in commercial and consumer markets. Mr. Angle's vision and commitment were recently recognized when he was named the Ernst and Young New England Entrepreneurs of the Year for 2003 (with iRobot co-founder Helen Greiner). This prestigious award lauds his vision, skills, accomplishments and determination in fostering the growth of a brainchild into a successful business. Mr. Angle holds a B.S. in Electrical Engineering and an M.S. in Computer Science, both from MIT.
 

The time has come for roboticists to respect Isaac Asimov's prognostication. We have the technology to produce robots that can serve us in our homes. This talk will introduce industrial robots to the nouveau devotees and swing immediately into the real prospects for robots that could serve our personal needs. The robotic technology that is currently available, along with the range of service robot applications that are being exploited or ready for exploitation, will be described. Next, a critical overview of the robotic niches that serve to amuse us or even carry out single household functions will be covered. Finally, a discussion of the potential for a care-giving robot to support the elderly and infirmed, thereby extending independent living at a much lower cost than a nursing home, the bane of our senior citizens.

Walter Weisel, Chairman & CEO of Robotic Workspace Technologies, has had a multifaceted career that spans over 29 years of direct robotic and automation industry experience. From Cincinnati Milacron, working hands-on with machine controls and computers, to working with the initial developers of the industrial robot, at Unimation, Inc., Walter Weisel's strong leadership and vision found him at the helm of Prab Robots, Inc. as COO, President and CEO; while also serving as a three term President of the Robotic Industries Association (RIA). During his tenure at Prab Robots, Inc. he took the company public with a successful public offering, and grew revenues over 700%. Mr. Weisel is a recipient of the Joseph Engelberger Award, and has also served as President of Robotics International, which represents over 12,000 members
 

The Robotics Institute at Carnegie Mellon has been conducting robotics research since 1979, and now has over 300 faculty and technical staff with an annual sponsored research budget of 45 million dollars.  The diversity of research activity suggests a range of commercial applications far exceeding the popular conception of robotics.  In this forward thinking keynote session, Matt Mason, Director of the Robotics Institute at Carnegie Mellon University (CMU), will describe a variety of technologies currently under development at CMU and the implications of these initiatives for future commercial robotics applications.

Matt Mason is the Director of the Robotics Institute at Carnegie Mellon University.  His career began with graduate studies at the MIT Artificial Intelligence Lab.  Since 1982 he has been on the faculty of Computer Science and Robotics at CMU, with brief stints at Sandia National Labs and IBM Yorktown Heights.  He is co-author of "Robot Hands and the Mechanics of Manipulation" (MIT Press 1985), co-editor of "Robot Motion: Planning and Control" (MIT Press 1982), and author of "Mechanics of Robotic Manipulation" (MIT Press 2001).  He is a winner of the System Development Foundation Prize, a Fellow of the AAAI, and a Fellow of the IEEE.
 

No longer restricted to the factory floor or hazardous environments, robots are making their way into human environments. Although current examples of domestic robots are more akin to smart appliances or supervised tools, the need to help ordinary people as capable partners and interact with them in a socially appropriate manner poses new challenges and opens new opportunities for robot applications in the home, office, school, entertainment locales, healthcare institutions, and more. Developing robots with social and emotional intelligence is a critical step towards enabling them to be intelligent and capable in their interactions with humans, intuitive to communicate with people, able to work cooperatively with people, and able to learn quickly and effectively from natural human instruction. This talk explores issues related to the design of sociable robots from artistic, scientific, and technological perspectives. Specific research projects are highlighted to illustrate how robots with social capabilities are being applied to assist or entertain their human counterparts.

Cynthia Breazeal is an assistant professor of Media Arts and Sciences at the MIT Media Lab where she is director of the Robotic Life Group and holds the LG Group career development chair. She is a pioneer of the areas of human-robot interaction and sociable robotics, and leading in the scientific pursuit and technological innovation necessary to create machines that understand and engage people in social and affective terms. Kismet, her anthropomorphic robotic head, has been featured in international media and is the subject of her book Designing Sociable Robots, published by the MIT Press. She continues to develop anthropomorphic robots as part of her ongoing work of building artificial systems that learn from and interact with people in an intelligent, life-like, and sociable manner.

One of the barriers for people coming up with their own mobile robots is the cost and effort to create a suitable chassis.  In this seminar, author Myke Predko will discuss the issues of using different toy and hobby remote control car chassis as the base for a robot.  To illustrate the concepts being discussed, the conversion of a Radio Shack “ZipZaps” remote control car into a mobile robot will be presented.  This robot can be assembled for as little as $10 over the cost of a ZipZaps over the course of an afternoon. 

Myke Predko is responsible for server and high performance system test at Celestica, Inc. He holds a BSEE from the University of Waterloo. Living in Toronto Canada, he is the author of 13 books, published by McGraw-Hill, on different topics in electronics and engineering.

In this illuminating session, Ken Goldberg will describe how he has combined his passion for art and robotics to deliver compelling and innovative artistic projects. During the presentation, he will describe a series of such artworks including the Telegarden, a robot that allows users to view, plant and grow plants in a living garden, Tele-Twister, a cyber version of the '60s party game, a project that allow users to interact with a live Ouija board and other projects based on state-of-the-art in robotic Web cameras.

Ken Goldberg is an artist and professor of engineering at UC Berkeley. His work has been exhibited at the Walker Art Center, Ars Electronica (Linz Austria), ZKM (Karlsruhe), Venice Biennale, Pompidou Center (Paris), ICC Biennale (Tokyo), Kwangju Biennale (Seoul), Artists Space, The Kitchen, and the Whitney Biennial.  He has also held visiting positions at MIT Media Lab, Art Center College of Design, and the San Francisco Art Institute. Goldberg is Founding Director of UC Berkeley's popular Art, Technology, and Culture Colloquium, now in its eighth year.  Goldberg was awarded the National Science Foundation Young Investigator Award in 1994, the NSF Presidential Faculty Fellowship in 1995, the Joseph Engelberger Robotics Award in 2000, and the IEEE Major Educational Innovation Award in 2001. He holds a PhD in Computer Science from Carnegie Mellon University.

Autonomous robotics encompasses the rich nature of integrated systems that include mechanical, electrical, and computational components. The availability of smaller and affordable hardware components have helped make it possible for students to be involved in various robotics projects in classes and in after school programs that are aiming to improve students’ critical thinking skills. These programs also support multi-disciplinary and co-operative learning. There currently is an urgent need to attract students to science and engineering careers; in an effort to do this, there have been many autonomous robot competitions for students of all ages, from grade school to graduate school. Research oriented competitions have also been organized to promote the development of robotics technologies. As a result, robotics is popular around the globe and robotics competitions are providing benefits to students, academia, industry, and society at large. This presentation will address the current status of robotics education, problems, and the ideal pedagogical model involving robot competitions and robotics education.

CJ Chung is an Associate Professor of Computer Science at Lawrence Technological University, Southfield, Michigan. His industrial experience includes Software Engineer at Korea Electric Power Company, Senior Research Scientist at Electronics and Telecommunication Research Institute in Korea; and Visiting Research Scientist at L.M. Ericsson AB, Stockholm, Sweden. He has developed self-adaptive systems motivated by cultural evolution process that has been applied to various optimization problems. His research interests include evolutionary computation, evolutionary neural networks, evolutionary neuro-fuzzy systems, formal methods for real-time embedded systems, pervasive computing, and evolutionary robotics. He has published over 28 refereed technical articles in various journals and international conference proceedings. Dr. Chung’s most recent development has been an affordable laptop robotics platform for his computer science classes. He is the founder of the annual autonomous robotics contest, Robofest (www.robofest.net). Dr. Chung is a member of the International Robot Olympic Committee.

In this highly visual and exciting presentation, suitable for all age groups, Dan Kara, President of Robotics Trends, will describe the role of robots in society. Beginning with the ancient Greeks and continuing up until our own time, robots as tools, helpmates, heroes and villains will be reviewed. Attendees will also hear how robots are being utilized across the globe in many interesting and unexpected ways, now and in the future. Those attending the presentation will agree that we have truly entered the era where there will be robots, robots everywhere.

Dan Kara is President/Co-Founder of Robotics Trends, and Executive Editor, RoboticsTrends.com. He is a high technology media veteran and thought leading research analyst. Dan has published numerous articles on emerging robotics technologies, and is a sought after writer and lecturer. Prior to co-founding Robotics Trends he co-founded two highly successful integrated media firms, Intermedia Group and Software Productivity Group.

What’s the latest development in the consumer, hobby, educational and competition robots market? In this lively session designed for both children and adults alike, attendees will be provided with an overview of what is currently available in stores on and the Web today, and what we can expect in the future. Hobbyist robots, educational robotics products, as well as kits for competition robots will be discussed. Join David Calkins for a sneak peek at what's in stores and what's in store for you.

Myke Predko is responsible for server and high performance system test at Celestica, Inc. He holds a BSEE from the University of Waterloo. Living in Toronto Canada, he is the author of 13 books, published by McGraw-Hill, on different topics in electronics and engineering.

Playing Tag, Hide and Seek, and soccer have entertained children for generations. Learning to program multiple robots to play these games provides youth with an engaging and entertaining challenge. In this session, attendees will learn how Cooperative Mobile Robots, groups of distributed autonomous agents that are capable of working cooperatively in complex environments, can be employed to transform traditional approaches of education – turning education into entertainment. Specific examples of programs introduced at RoboTech Center that have transformed participants into ardent robotic enthusiasts will be described.

Nanu Swamy is an educational Entrepreneur and the Founder/Director of Technology at RoboTech Center, a robotics based educational center whose mission is to find new tools and paradigms for learning.  His passion is to create and present fundamentally new approaches to portray technology in simple, easy to understand paradigms, which could be easily appropriated by the younger generation.  Prior to founding RoboTech Center, he held echnical and managerial positions at Micropolis Corporation, Singapore Airlines, Sybase, GiantLoop Networks, Information Resources (a division of Oracle) and OpenMarket (now Divine Systems).

Since 1999, Alan Federman has been involved with several National Champion robotics competition teams. During that time he has found that while  technical expertise is certainly important, the personalities of the team members and how they interact, is probably even more important in determining the team's performance. Successful teams are:
- Passionate - The team members are inspired to perform at at high level.
- Planners - They sped a lot of time and effort on doing the best they can.
- Persevering - They learn to triumph over adversity, because they are experienced at it.
In this lively session, attendees will learn about how technologies and personalities can be 'tuned' to create willing robotics competitors.

Dr. Alan Federman has been involved in competitive robotics since 1999. He has mentored the FIRST National Champions (2000), Botball National Champions (2001), FIRST Chairman's Award Winner (2004) FIRST National Finalists (2005). From 1999 to 2005 he worked for NASA's Robotics Education Project, and still answers questions as "Dr. Bot" for the REP website. Dr. Bot has also been a judge on the "Battlebots" TV show. According to Alan, he never made a bad call, but occasionally got outvoted by those "other guys."

In this highly visual and exciting presentation, suitable for all age groups, Dan Kara, President of Robotics Trends, will describe the role of robots in society. Beginning with the ancient Greeks and continuing up until our own time, robots as tools, helpmates, heroes and villains will be reviewed. Attendees will also hear how robots are being utilized across the globe in many interesting and unexpected ways, now and in the future. Those attending the presentation will agree that we have truly entered the era where there will be robots, robots everywhere.

Dan Kara is President/Co-Founder of Robotics Trends, and Executive Editor, RoboticsTrends.com. He is a high technology media veteran and thought leading research analyst. Dan has published numerous articles on emerging robotics technologies, and is a sought after writer and lecturer. Prior to co-founding Robotics Trends he co-founded two highly successful integrated media firms, Intermedia Group and Software Productivity Group.