Event
NG Microsystems/LM Robotics Seminar: Dario Floreano, "Biologically Inspired Drones"
Friday, April 13, 2018
4:00 p.m.
1146 A.V. Williams Building
Ian White; Ania Picard
ianwhite@umd.edu; appicard@umd.edu
Biologically Inspired Drones
Dario Floreano
Professor
Laboratory of Intelligent Systems
Ecole polytechnique fédérale de Lausanne
Switzerland
This seminar is co-sponsored by the Maryland Robotics Center as part of its Lockheed Martin Robotics Seminar Series.
Host: Reza Ghodssi
Abstract
We are witnessing the advent of a new era of drones that can autonomously fly in natural and man-made environments. These robots will have help in many civilian tasks, including transportation, communication, agriculture, disaster mitigation and environment preservation. However, autonomous flight in confined spaces and near humans presents great scientific and technical challenges owing to the perceptual intelligence required to negotiate complex environments and to the safety requirements. In this context, flying organisms provide a rich source of inspiration. In this talk I will show biologically-inspired design principles and soft robotics technologies that can improve the perceptual, mechanical, and functional capabilities as well as the safety of drones.
Biography
Dario Floreano (M.A. 1988; M.S. 1992; Ph.D. 1995) is the director of the Laboratory of Intelligent Systems and director of the Swiss National Center of Competence in Robotics. He is member of the Global Agenda Council on Robotics and Smart Devices of the World Economic Forum. He is co-founder of the company senseFly S.A., of the International Society for Artificial Life, and founder of the popular robotics podcast series Talking Robots (which later became RobotsPodcast).
He has been on the advisory board of the Future and Emerging Technologies division of the European Commission, on the advisory board of the Institute for Advanced Studies in Budapest, and on the board of governors of the International Society for Neural Networks. Prof. Floreano is a senior member of the IEEE and received several national and international awards for professional and cultural achievements. Prof. Floreano is or has been on the editorial board of the international journals: Neural Networks (Pergamon), Genetic Programming and Evolvable Machines (Kluwer), Adaptive Behavior (Sage), Artificial Life (MIT Press), Connection Science (Francis & Taylor), Evolutionary Computation (MIT Press), Evolutionary Intelligence (Springer), IEEE Transactions on Evolutionary Computation (IEEE), Autonomous Robots (Kluwer).
