Legged Robots Across Scales: Integrating Motion Planning and Control through Canonical Locomotion Models

Speaker: Ioannis Poulakakis , University of Delaware-Department of Mechanical Engineering

Date: Tuesday, April 28, 2015

Time: 11:00 AM to 12:00 PM Note: all times are in the Eastern Time Zone

Refreshments: 12:00 PM

Public: Yes

Location: 1-190

Event Type:

Room Description:

Host: Russ Tedrake, MIT CSAIL

Contact: Britton Bradley, 617-253-6583, bryt@csail.mit.edu

Relevant URL: http://www.me.udel.edu/people/poulakakis.html

Speaker URL: None

Speaker Photo:
None

Reminders to: robotics@mit.edu, seminars@csail.mit.edu, poulakas@udel.edu

Reminder Subject: TALK: Legged Robots Across Scales: Integrating Motion Planning and Control through Canonical Locomotion Models

Abstract: On a macroscopic level, legged locomotion can be understood through reductive canonical models -- often termed templates -- the purpose of which is to capture the dominant features of an observed locomotion behavior without delving into the fine details of a robot’s (or animal’s) structure and morphology. Such models offer unifying, platform-independent, descriptions of task-level behaviors, and inform control design for legged robots. This talk will discuss reductive locomotion models for diverse legged robots, ranging from slow-moving, palm-size, eight-legged crawlers to larger bipeds and quadrupeds, and will focus on the role of such models in integrating locomotion control and motion planning within a unifying framework that translates task-level specifications to suitable low-level control actions that harness the locomotion capabilities of the robot platforms.

Bio: Prof. Poulakakis earned his Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering from the University of Michigan in 2008, served as a postdoctoral research associate at Princeton University for two years, and then joined the Department of Mechanical Engineering at the University of Delaware in 2010 as an Assistant Professor. His research interests are in the area of dynamics and control with application to bio-inspired robotic systems, specifically legged robots. In 2014 he received a Faculty Early Career Development Award from the National Science Foundation to investigate task planning and motion control for legged robots at different scales.

This talk is presented as part of MIT's Spring 2015 Campus-wide Robotics Seminar (sponsored by Aurora Flight Sciences and The MathWorks).

Research Areas:

Impact Areas:

See other events that are part of the Robotics@MIT Seminar Series 2015.

Created by Britton Bradley at Wednesday, April 22, 2015 at 4:44 PM.