Lilly Clark – Robohub https://robohub.org Connecting the robotics community to the world Mon, 05 Oct 2026 01:07:30 +0000 en-US hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=7.1.3 ep.362: Precise Navigation using LEO Satellites, with Tyler Reid https://robohub.org/precise-navigation-using-leo-satellites/ Wed, 02 Nov 2022 17:21:28 +0000 https://robohub.org/?p=205310

Dr. Tyler Reid, co-founder and CTO of Xona Space Systems, discusses a new type of global navigation satellite system (GNSS). Xona Space Systems plans to provide centimeter-level positioning accuracy and will serve the emerging autonomous vehicle community, where precise navigation is key. Reid discusses the advantages and technical challenges of a low Earth orbit (LEO) solution.

Tyler Reid

Tyler Reid is co-founder and CTO of Xona Space Systems. Previously, Tyler worked as a Research Engineer at the Ford Motor Company in localization and mapping for self-driving cars. He has also worked as an engineer at Google and as a lecturer at Stanford University, where he co-taught the GPS course. Tyler received his PhD (2017) and MSc (2012) in Aeronautics and Astronautics from Stanford and B.Eng. (’10) in Mechanical Engineering from McGill.

 

 

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]]> ep.359: Perception and Decision-Making for Underwater Robots, with Brendan Englot https://robohub.org/perception-and-decision-making-for-underwater-robots/ Sun, 21 Aug 2022 11:38:58 +0000 https://robohub.org/?p=204941

Prof Brendan Englot, from Stevens Institute of Technology, discusses the challenges in perception and decision-making for underwater robots – especially in the field. He discusses ongoing research using the BlueROV platform and autonomous driving simulators.

Brendan Englot

Brendan Englot received his S.B., S.M., and Ph.D. degrees in mechanical engineering from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 2007, 2009, and 2012, respectively. He is currently an Associate Professor with the Department of Mechanical Engineering at Stevens Institute of Technology in Hoboken, New Jersey. At Stevens, he also serves as interim director of the Stevens Institute for Artificial Intelligence. He is interested in perception, planning, optimization, and control that enable mobile robots to achieve robust autonomy in complex physical environments, and his recent work has considered sensing tasks motivated by underwater surveillance and inspection applications, and path planning with multiple objectives, unreliable sensors, and imprecise maps.

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]]> ep.342: Unconventional Space Robots, with Stephanie Schneider https://robohub.org/unconventional-space-robots/ Fri, 17 Dec 2021 09:15:32 +0000 https://robohub.org/?p=202580

Lilly interviews Stephanie Schneider, a PhD candidate at Stanford working on unconventional space robotics. Schneider explains her work on Reachbot, a long-reach crawling and anchoring robot, which repurposes extendable booms for mobile manipulation. They discuss the challenges and exciting elements of robotic prototyping for low-gravity or otherwise unique environments.

Stephanie Schneider

Stephanie Schneider is a Ph.D. candidate in Aeronautics and Astronautics in the Autonomous Systems Laboratory at Stanford, working with Professor Marco Pavone. She received her BS in Mechanical Engineering from Cornell University in 2014. Stephanie’s research interests include real-time spacecraft motion-planning, grasping and manipulation in space, and adaptive control for autonomous robotics.

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]]> ep.339: High Capacity Ride Sharing, with Alex Wallar https://robohub.org/high-capacity-ride-sharing/ Tue, 12 Oct 2021 15:52:12 +0000 https://robohub.org/?p=201319


 

In this episode, our interviewer Lilly speaks to Alex Wallar, co-founder and CTO of The Routing Company. Wallar shares his background in multi-robot path-planning and optimization, and his research on scheduling and routing algorithms for high-capacity ride-sharing. They discuss how The Routing Company helps cities meet the needs of their people, the technical ins and outs of their dispatcher and assignment system, and the importance of public transit to cities and their economics.

Alex Wallar

Alex Wallar is Co-founder and CTO of the Routing Company, an on-demand vehicle routing and management platform that partners with cities to power the future of public transit. Previously he was pursuing a PhD in the Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Lab at MIT, conducting research on mathematical optimization for high-capacity ride-sharing.

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]]> ep.338: Marsupial Robots, with Chris Lee https://robohub.org/marsupial-robots/ Tue, 14 Sep 2021 18:58:59 +0000 https://robohub.org/marsupial-robots/

Lilly interviews Chris Lee, a graduate student at Oregon State University. Lee explains his research on marsupial robots, or carrier-passenger pairs of heterogeneous robot systems. They discuss the possible applications of marsupial robots including the DARPA Subterranean Competition, and some of the technical challenges including optimal deployment formulated as a stochastic assignment problem.

Chris Lee

Chris Lee is pursuing a Master of Science in Robotics at Oregon State University, having received a Bachelor of Science in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Buffalo. His research is in robotic exploration, frontier extraction, and stochastic assignment.

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]]> ep.332: Swarms in Space, with Giovanni Beltrame https://robohub.org/swarms-in-space/ Mon, 10 May 2021 16:16:27 +0000 https://robohub.org/swarms-in-space/

In this episode, Lilly interviews Giovanni Beltrame, Professor of Computer and Software Engineering at École Polytechnique de Montréal where he directs the Making Innovative Space Technology (MIST) lab. Beltrame highlights the technical challenges of exploring another planet with a swarm of robots controlled by an astronaut operator. They discuss minimizing cognitive load for the operator, analog missions to volcanic lava tubes on Earth, and spherical hopping robots for the moon.

Giovanni Beltrame

Giovanni Beltrame received the M.Sc. degree in electrical engineering and computer science from the University of Illinois, Chicago, in 2001, the Laurea degree in computer engineering from the Politecnico di Milano, Italy, in 2002, the M.S. degree in information technology from CEFRIEL, Milan, in 2002, and the Ph.D. degree in computer engineering from the Politecnico di Milano, in 2006. He worked as an engineer at the European Space Agency until 2010, and he is currently a Professor at École Polytechnique de Montréal, Canada, where he directs the MIST Laboratory.

 
 
 

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]]> ep.331: Multi-Robot Learning, with Amanda Prorok https://robohub.org/multi-robot-learning/ Mon, 29 Mar 2021 18:37:11 +0000 https://robohub.org/multi-robot-learning/

Image credit: J. Blumenkamp, Q. Li, H. Zhong

In this episode, Lilly interviews Amanda Prorok, Professor of Computer Science and Technology at the University of Cambridge. Prorok discusses her research on multi-robot and multi-agent systems and learning coordination policies via Graph Neural Networks. They dig into her recent work on self-interested robots and finding explainability in emergent behavior.

Amanda Prorok

Amanda Prorok is an Assistant Professor (University Lecturer) in the Department of Computer Science and Technology, at Cambridge University, and a Fellow of Pembroke College. She serves as Associate Editor for IEEE Robotics and Automation Letters (R-AL) and Associate Editor for Autonomous Robots (AURO). Prior to joining Cambridge, Prorok was a postdoctoral researcher at the General Robotics, Automation, Sensing and Perception (GRASP) Laboratory at the University of Pennsylvania, USA, where she worked with Prof. Vijay Kumar. She completed her PhD at EPFL, Switzerland, with Prof. Alcherio Martinoli.

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]]> ep.329: Robots-as-a-Service, with Afshin Doust https://robohub.org/robots-as-a-service/ Wed, 24 Feb 2021 18:56:29 +0000 https://robohub.org/robots-as-a-service/

Image credit: Techcouver

In this episode, Lilly interviews Afshin Doust, CEO of Advanced Intelligent Systems. Doust explains the company’s modular, robots-as-a-service subscription business model. They discuss robotic solutions for the agricultural industry, disinfecting robots to combat COVID19, and other exciting new developments at AIS.

Afshin Doust

Afshin Doust is the Chief Executive Officer of Advanced Intelligent Systems (AIS). He is a seasoned entrepreneur with professional experience in finance, sales, business consulting, and strategic management with a keen interest in assembling teams to resolve business challenges.  Afshin took the role of CEO at AIS in 2016, with the goal to lead the team towards the vision of creating innovations in autonomous robotic solutions for a wide range of applications.

 

 

 

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]]> ep.327: Computational Design, with Bernhard Thomaszewski https://robohub.org/computational-design/ Wed, 27 Jan 2021 16:56:46 +0000 https://robohub.org/computational-design/

Image from B. Thomaszewski, S. Pabst and W. Strasser

Lilly interviews Bernhard Thomaszewski, Professor of Computer Science at the University of Montréal and research scientist at ETH Zurich. Thomaszewski discusses his background in animation at Disney, his current work on mechanical metamaterials and digital fabrication, and how physics-based modeling has connected the dots.

Bernhard Thomaszewski

CREDIT: AMÉLIE PHILIBERT

Bernhard Thomaszewski is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Computer Science and Operations Research at the University of Montréal. Until June 2017, he was a Research Scientist at Disney Research Zurich, heading the group on Computational Design and Digital Fabrication. Thomaszewski obtained his Master’s degree and PhD (Dr. rer. nat) in Computer Science from the University of Tübingen. Before joining Disney, he spent a year at the computer graphics group at ETH Zürich.

 
 
 

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]]> ep.322: Exploring Venus with a Clockwork Rover, with Jonathan Sauder https://robohub.org/exploring-venus-with-a-clockwork-rover/ Wed, 04 Nov 2020 06:48:04 +0000 https://robohub.org/exploring-venus-with-a-clockwork-rover/

An illustration of a concept for a possible wind-powered Venus rover.
Credits: NASA/JPL-Caltech

In this episode, Lilly interviews Jonathan Sauder, the Principal Investigator of a NASA Innovative Advanced Concepts project to design a rover for the surface of Venus. Sauder explains why exploring Venus is important and why previous surface missions have only lasted a few hours. They discuss his innovative wheeled-robot concept, a hybrid automaton rover which would be mostly mechanical and powered by wind.

Jonathan Sauder

Jonathan Sauder is a NASA Innovative Advanced Concepts (NIAC) Fellow and Senior Mechatronics Engineer at NASA Jet Propulsion Lab in the Technology Infusion Group focused on innovative concepts.  He is also a lecturer of “Design Theory and Methodology” and “Advanced Mechanical Design” at the University of Southern California, where he received his PhD in Mechanical Engineering.

 

 

 

 

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]]> ep.320: Planetary Drilling, with Kris Zacny https://robohub.org/planetary-drilling/ Wed, 07 Oct 2020 08:22:44 +0000 https://robohub.org/planetary-drilling/

In this episode, Lilly Clark interviews Kris Zacny, the Vice President of Exploration Technologies at Honeybee Robotics.  They discuss two focuses of development at Honeybee: technology for finding extinct extraterrestrial life and technology for in-situ resource utilization. Zacny speaks about the design and operation of current flight projects, and why drilling technology is key to these missions.

Kris Zacny

Dr. Kris Zacny is VP and Senior Research Scientist at Honeybee Robotics. His interests include space mining, sample handling, soil and rock mechanics, extraterrestrial drilling, and In Situ Resource Utilization (ISRU). He co-founded Exploration Technology Division (EX), based in Altadena, CA. EX, with over 100 employees, focuses on developing space mining robots.

In his previous capacity as an engineer in South African underground gold, diamond, and coal mines, Dr. Zacny managed numerous mining projects and production divisions. This hands-on experience related to drilling and mining became invaluable in developing such technologies for space. Dr. Zacny received his PhD (UC Berkeley, 2005) in Geotechnical Engineering with an emphasis on Extraterrestrial Drilling and Mining, ME (UC Berkeley, 2001) in Petroleum Engineering with emphasis on Drilling and Materials Science, and BSc cum laude (U. Cape Town, 1997) in Mechanical Engineering. He participated in several Antarctic, Arctic, Atacama, and Greenland expeditions. Dr Zacny has approx. 200 publications, he has been a PI/Co-I on approx. 50 projects, he has over 40 NASA New Technology Records and four NASA Group Achievement Awards.

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]]> ep.316: Introspective Robots, with Nathan Michael https://robohub.org/introspective-robots/ Sun, 09 Aug 2020 19:59:51 +0000 https://robohub.org/introspective-robots/

In this episode, Lilly interviews Nathan Michael, Professor and Director of the Resilient Intelligent Systems Lab at the Robotics Institute within Carnegie Mellon University. They discuss introspection, adaptation, and evolvement in robotics. Michael speaks about topics in state estimation and distributed perception, and other challenges in control, perception, and cognition for both single and multi-robot systems.

Nathan Michael

Nathan Michael is an Associate Research Professor and the Director of the Resilient Intelligent Systems Lab at the Robotics Institute within Carnegie Mellon University (CMU). Professor Michael’s research seeks to enable the development of self-sufficient robots and teams of robots that can respond to disasters; robots which can perform the tasks of first responders in order to reduce the number of people placed in harm’s way. His research employs the principles of resilient intelligence and persistent knowledge to enable robots to innovate to solve complex problems, to overcome unanticipated challenges and to learn from their experiences. Applications of Professor Michael’s work include the use of autonomous robots to explore earthquake-damaged buildings and the deployment of unmanned aerial systems to inspect nuclear reactor cores and measure radiation levels.

 

 

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]]> ep.314: High Earth Orbit Robotics, with William Crowe https://robohub.org/high-earth-orbit-robotics/ Tue, 14 Jul 2020 15:02:41 +0000 https://robohub.org/high-earth-orbit-robotics/

In this episode, Lilly interviews Dr. William Crowe, CEO of High Earth Orbit (HEO) Robotics. The mission of HEO Robotics is to provide high quality imagery of satellites, space-debris and resource-rich asteroids. Crowe discusses the technical challenges which make robotics and satellites similar like computer vision and controls, and those where traditional robotics approaches aren’t suitable like localization and mobility. He explains new trends in the satellite industry, and the need for high quality imagery.

William Crowe

William Crowe is CEO of High Earth Orbit Robotics, a company that performs health checks on satellites by assessing data on images they take from other satellites. He has a PhD in Astrodynamics, where his research focused on the use of swarms to characterize asteroids, especially those that fly closer than the Moon. William sees a future where we use the resources of space in space to better our Earth.

 

 

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]]> ep.309: Learning to Grasp, with Jeannette Bohg https://robohub.org/learning-to-grasp/ Mon, 11 May 2020 05:41:01 +0000 https://robohub.org/learning-to-grasp/

In this episode, Lilly Clark interviews Jeannette Bohg, Assistant Professor at Stanford, about her work in interactive perception and robot learning for grasping and manipulation tasks. Bohg discusses how robots and humans are different, the challenge of high dimensional data, and unsolved problems including continuous learning and decentralized manipulation.

Jeannette Bohg is an Assistant Professor of Computer Science at Stanford University. She was a group leader at MPI until September 2017 and remains affiliated as a guest researcher. Her research focuses on perception for autonomous robotic manipulation and grasping. She is specifically interested in developing methods that are goal-directed, real-time and multi-modal such that they can provide meaningful feedback for execution and learning.

Before joining the Autonomous Motion lab in January 2012, Jeannette Bohg was a PhD student at the Computer Vision and Active Perception lab (CVAP) at KTH in Stockholm. Her thesis on Multi-modal scene understanding for Robotic Grasping was performed under the supervision of Prof. Danica Kragic. She studied at Chalmers in Gothenburg and at the Technical University in Dresden where she received her Masters in Art and Technology and her Diploma in Computer Science, respectively.

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]]> ep.307: Commercializing Robot Brains, with Kajal Gada https://robohub.org/commercializing-robot-brains/ Mon, 13 Apr 2020 18:08:54 +0000 https://robohub.org/commercializing-robot-brains/

In this episode, Lilly interviews Kajal Gada on her work at BrainCorp, the San Diego-based company behind BrainOS, a technology stack for autonomous solutions. Kajal discusses BrainCorp’s cloud-connected operating system and their floor cleaning, vacuuming, and warehouse delivery robots. She also articulates some of the challenges in becoming a software engineer and developing commercial solutions.

Kajal Gada

Kajal Gada is a software engineer at BrainCorp. She works on developing algorithms for realizing robotic operations in the real world. Kajal received her Masters in Robotics from University of Maryland – College Park, and also has an MBA in Technology Management from NMIMS, Mumbai. She is an advocate for women in the workplace and has spoken at GHC in 2018. In her free time, she loves to read mystery novels and work on puzzles

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]]> ep.305: Coordination, Cooperation, and Collaboration, with Vijay Kumar https://robohub.org/coordination-cooperation-and-collaboration/ Sun, 01 Mar 2020 18:35:33 +0000 https://robohub.org/coordination-cooperation-and-collaboration/


In this interview, Lilly interviews Vijay Kumar, Professor and Dean at the University of Pennsylvania. He discusses coordination, cooperation, and collaboration in multi-robot systems. He also explains where he draws inspiration from in his research, and why robotics has yet to meet science fiction.

Vijay Kumar

Vijay Kumar is the Nemirovsky Family Dean of Penn Engineering with appointments in the Departments of Mechanical Engineering and Applied Mechanics, Computer and Information Science, and Electrical and Systems Engineering at the University of Pennsylvania. Kumar’s group works on creating autonomous ground and aerial robots, designing bio-inspired algorithms for collective behaviors, and on robot swarms. They have won many best paper awards at conferences, and group alumni are leaders in teaching, research, business and entrepreneurship. Kumar is a fellow of ASME and IEEE and a member of the National Academy of Engineering.

Vijay Kumar has held many administrative positions in the School of Engineering and Applied Science, including director of the GRASP Laboratory, chair of Mechanical Engineering and Applied Mechanics, and the position of the Deputy Dean. He served as the assistant director of robotics and cyber physical systems at the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy.

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]]> ep.302: Robots That Can See, Do, and Win, with Juxi Leitner https://robohub.org/robots-that-can-see-do-and-win/ Wed, 29 Jan 2020 18:04:18 +0000 https://robohub.org/robots-that-can-see-do-and-win/


In this episode, Lilly interviews Juxi Leitner, a Postdoctoral Research Fellow at the Queensland University of Technology and Co-Founder/CEO of LYRO Robotics. LYRO spun out of the 2017 win of the Amazon Robotics Challenge by Team ACRV. Here Juxi discusses deep learning, computer vision, intent in grasping and manipulation, and bridging the gap between abstract and low-level understandings of the world. He also discusses why robotics is really an integration field, the Amazon and other robotics challenges, and what’s important to consider when spinning an idea into a company.

Juxi Leitner

Juxi Leitner is co-founder of LYRO Robotics, a deep-tech startup based in Brisbane, Australia, creating robotic picking and packing solutions. LYRO is a spin-out of the Australian Centre of Excellence for Robotic Vision (ACRV), where Juxi is the research lead for the manipulation research stream (previously Vision and Action project). His research focus is on integrating Robotics, Computer Vision and Machine Learning/Artificial Intelligence (AI) for robust grasping and manipulation in real-world scenarios. In 2017 his team won the Amazon Robotics Challenge. Juxi is active in the local Brisbane deep-tech ecosystem and started Brisbane.AI and the Brisbane robotics interest group.

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]]> ep.300: Past and Present Podcast Team Members, with Sabine Hauert, Peter Dürr and Andra Keay https://robohub.org/past-and-present-podcast-team-members/ Sun, 22 Dec 2019 18:39:14 +0000 https://robohub.org/past-and-present-podcast-team-members/

Welcome to the 300th episode of the Robohub podcast! You might not know that the podcast has been going in one form or another for 14 years. Originally called “Talking Robots,” the podcast was started in 2006 by Dario Floreano and several of his PhD students at EPFL, in Switzerland, including Sabine Hauert, Peter Dürr, and Markus Waibel, who are all still involved in Robohub today.  Since then, the podcast team has become international, with most of its interviewers in the United States and Europe, and all of its members being volunteers.

To celebrate 300 episodes of our podcast, we thought we would catch up with some of our former, as well as current, volunteers from around the world to find out why and how they got involved in the podcast, how their involvement impacted on their lives and careers, and what they’re doing in their day jobs now.

First up, Sabine Hauert, one of Professor Floreano’s former students, now, Assistant Professor in the Bristol Robotics Laboratory at the University of Bristol in the UK. Sabine, whose work focuses on swarm robotics, is also acting President and Co-founder of Robohub.org. She spoke to our interviewer Lilly.

Next, our interviewer and current podcast President Audrow caught up with Peter Dürr, who now leads a team in Switzerland focused on Computer Vision research, whilst remaining active with the podcast by editing all of our episodes.

And last, but definitely not least, Andra Keay, Managing Director of non-profit industry group Silicon Valley Robotics, and long standing member of Robohub, spoke to our interviewer Lauren about her company, and women in robotics.

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]]> ep.298: Cognitive Robotics Under Uncertainty, with Marlyse Reeves https://robohub.org/cognitive-robotics-under-uncertainty/ Tue, 26 Nov 2019 08:23:09 +0000 https://robohub.org/cognitive-robotics-under-uncertainty/



In this episode Lilly Clark interviews Marlyse Reeves, PhD student at MIT, about her work in cognitive robotics and hybrid activity-motion planning. Reeves discusses the role of robotics in space, the challenges of multi-vehicle missions, planning under uncertainty, and her work on an underwater exploration mission.

Marlyse Reeves

Marlyse is a third-year PhD student in the Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory at MIT. She received her B.S. in Aeronautics and Astronautics from MIT in 2017. Her current research in the Model-based Embedded and Robotic Systems Group focuses on multi-vehicle online planning, incorporating complex dynamics and constraints. She is also interested in risk-aware planning, fault protection and diagnosis, and adaptive sampling. Outside of the lab, she enjoys playing soccer, dancing, and reading science fiction.

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]]> ep.296: Robust Robotics and the Quest for Intelligence, with Nicholas Roy https://robohub.org/robust-robotics-and-the-quest-for-intelligence/ Tue, 29 Oct 2019 00:45:54 +0000 https://robohub.org/robust-robotics-and-the-quest-for-intelligence/


In this episode Lilly Clark interviews Nicholas Roy, Professor of Aeronautics and Astronautics at MIT, about the Quest for Intelligence initiative and his research in robust robotics. Roy discusses how cognitive science pushes artificial intelligence, further pushing the capabilities of engineering tools and services, and speaks about the importance of explainable and ethical AI. He explains the challenges of capturing context and semantics in useful models of a system, and designing unmanned aerial vehicles and robots which interact with humans.

Nicholas Roy

Nicholas Roy is the Bisplinghoff Professor of Aeronautics and Astronautics at MIT, and leads the Robust Robotics Group in the Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory. He received a BS and MS from McGill University, and a PhD from Carnegie Mellon University. His research interests span robotics, machine learning, planning and reasoning, and human-computer interaction.

 
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]]> ep.287: Robonomics Platform: Integrating Robots into the Economy, with Aleksandr Kapitonov https://robohub.org/robonomics-platform-integrating-robots-into-the-economy/ Tue, 28 May 2019 17:45:15 +0000 https://robohub.org/robonomics-platform-integrating-robots-into-the-economy/



In this episode, Lilly Clark interviews Aleksandr Kapitonov, “robot economics” academic society professor at Airalab, on his work for Robonomics Platform, an Ethereum network infrastructure for integrating robots and cyber-physical systems directly into the economy. Kapitonov discusses the advantages of using blockchain, use cases including a fully autonomous vending machine, and the Robonomics technology stack.

Below are two videos showing the Robonomics Platform in action via a fully autonomous robot artist and drones for environmental monitoring.

Aleksandr Kapitonov

Aleksandr Kapitonov is a “robot economics” academic society progressor at Airalab (the team behind Robonomics Platform), an assistant professor of Control Systems and Robotics at ITMO University, and regional coordinator of the Erasmus+ IOT-OPEN.EU project for researching and developing IoT education practices. His research focuses on navigation, computer vision, control of mobile robots and communication for multi-agents systems.

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