ME393 Seminar on Bio-inspired and Human-Interactive Robotics

This seminar is run most quarters, depending on faculty availability, and covers a different theme each quarter. We select current and "classic" papers on the theme and discuss one or two papers each week. Students who have registered for one unit (pass/no credit) are required to lead the discussion at least once during the quarter. Preparation for discussion leaders involves reading the paper carefully, meeting with the instructor before class, and planning how to present the topic.

Fall 2010

• Location: CDR Bldg. 560 lobby
• Course materials will be posted on CourseWork site.
• Proposed Theme for Fall 2010: Hybrid Aerial/Surface Robotics (flying, perching, jumping...)

For future weeks:

• http://jeb.biologists.org/cgi/content/full/213/19/3378 -- how locusts control tumbling during jumps.

Week2: Flying squirrels and colugos

• Colugos, called "flying lemurs,"are not lemurs and are distantly related to homo sapiens: http://www.colugos.com/flying-lemur.html
• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colugo
• http://www.ecologyasia.com/verts/mammals/colugo.htm (good pictures)
• http://www.flyingsquirrels.com/Video/Wild/index.html -- various videos of flying squirrels
• http://www.brown.edu/Departments/EEB/EML/files/bishop_jeb06.pdf -- good general discussion of morphology and gliding
• http://www6.semo.edu/biograd/Theses/Dani%20Birdsill%20thesis.pdf -- MS thesis with more detail from Scheibe group, including details on the setup.

Spring 2010

• Location: CDR Bldg. 560 lobby
• The course materials will be posted on CourseWork site.
• Theme for Spring 2010: Haptics in Medicine

Winter 2010

Fall 2009, Theme: Sensor-mediated manipulation primitives

• Location: CDR Bldg. 560 lobby -- unless we get a chance to move somewhere more upscale
• For the course materials, follow the link to the CourseWork site. (Papers for class will be posted here):

While waiting for coursework site to be set up:

Week 1: (Angelo and Samson) -- A look at the octopus as an interesting approach to the control of (highly sophisticated) arms for reaching and grasping actions, using a sensing and control system that is very different from the vertebrate model.
Some interesting papers:

• http://jeb.biologists.org/cgi/reprint/34/1/131
• http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/abstract/293/5536/1845
• http://jn.physiology.org/cgi/content/full/94/2/1459#R9 - part II

Other links:

• http://www.octopusproject.eu/links.html

Should be some good videos too...