Mechanical engineer recognized by Society for Industrial and Applied Mathematics

Jorge Cortes, a professor in the Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering has been inducted as a 2020 Fellow by the Society for Industrial and Applied Mechanics.
Cortes is being recognized for contributions to the control and optimization of network systems.

The fellows were nominated for their exemplary research as well as outstanding service to the community. Through their contributions, SIAM Fellows help advance the fields of applied mathematics and computational science.

Cortés' research interests are on distributed coordination algorithms, autonomous robotic networks, adversarial networked systems, mathematical control theory, geometric mechanics and geometric integration. The recent emergence of low-cost, highly-autonomous vehicles with control, communication, sensing, and computing capabilities has paved the way for the deployment of robotic sensor networks in a wide range of applications. Controlled motion coordination of these networks will have far-reaching implications in the monitoring of natural phenomena and the enhancement of human capabilities in hazardous and unknown environments. Motivated by these scenarios, Professor Cortes' research program is developing systematic methodologies to control autonomous, reliable, and adaptive mobile networks capable of operating in unknown and dynamic environments.

Ruth J. Williams, from the UC San Diego Department of Mathematics, is also being recognized for contributions to the study of stochastic processes and their applications.

Full SIAM release here: https://sinews.siam.org/Details-Page/siam-announces-class-of-2020-fellows

What happens when two roboticists, one engineer and one holographic doctor are together on a panel?

Actor Robert Picardo, who played The Doctor in Star Trek Voyager. 

We found out Saturday, when when three of our professors were on the same panel at the holographic doctor from Star Trek Voyager, aka actor Robert Picardo. They discussed the future of healthcare robotics and AI. It was all that of "The Future of Medicine," an event hosted by the Clarke Center for Human Imagination, June 2 here on campus. Below is a Twitter thread with some of the event's highlights.

We are at "The Future of Medicine" event hosted by @imagineUCSD with @hiskov @LaurelRiek and @QI_UCSD director Ramesh Rao! @UCSDalumni @UCSanDiego

— UCSD Engineering (@UCSDJacobs) June 3, 2018

.@RobertPicardo the doctor from #StarTrek #Voyager: On our ship, two things were critical health care: #AI and the #Tricorer. This is what inspired the @Qualcomm #Tricorder #Xprize. #FutureofMedicine #smartsensors @UCSanDiego @UCSDalumni

— UCSD Engineering (@UCSDJacobs) June 3, 2018

#XPrize #Tricorder winner @BasilLeafTech: the tricorder in #StarTrek existed in 2160s, so we are already ahead of our time. #FutureofMedicine

— UCSD Engineering (@UCSDJacobs) June 3, 2018

The consumer testing was done @UCSanDiego for @Qualcomm #Tricorder #Xprize#FutureofMedicine@imagineUCSD @UCSDalumni

— UCSD Engineering (@UCSDJacobs) June 3, 2018

#AI has to earn the trust of patients and medical providers. It is the wave of the future: @BasilLeafTech at #FutureofMedicine event @UCSanDiego@UCSDHealth @UCSDalumni weekend

— UCSD Engineering (@UCSDJacobs) June 3, 2018

.@BasilLeafTech will conduct more clinical tests @UCSanDiego to improve #tricorder inspired device#FutureofMedicine @UCSDalumni weekend

— UCSD Engineering (@UCSDJacobs) June 3, 2018

Putting something into space is pretty easy. Working with humans is hard, jokes @UCSDHealth #familymedicine chair & #StarTrek fan Gene Kallenberg talking about testing #tricoder Patients were eager to take part. #FutureofMedicine @UCSDalumni weekend

— UCSD Engineering (@UCSDJacobs) June 3, 2018

Anything that can empower patients, providing more information, data, is helpful when they talk to a physician. I see this as tremendously beneficial in the future: @UCSDHealth Dr. Gene Kallenberg #FutureofMedicine @UCSDalumni weekend

— UCSD Engineering (@UCSDJacobs) June 3, 2018

Building the cloud so that #tricorders can talk to medical record system: Dr. @eviirre neurosurgeon & adjunct @UCSDHealth with help with @QI_UCSD's Ramesh Rao and @ucsd_cse #FutureofMedicine @UCSDalumni weekend

— UCSD Engineering (@UCSDJacobs) June 3, 2018

Next up: panel with @QI_UCSD director Ramesh Rao; Contextual #Robotics Institute director @hiskov; and @ucsd_cse professor @LaurelRiek, moderated by @RobertPicardo#FutureofMedicine @UCSDalumni weekend

— UCSD Engineering (@UCSDJacobs) June 3, 2018

From left: computer science professors Henrik Christensen and Laurel Riek.
Christensen is the director of the Contextual Robotics Institute at UC San Diego. 

.@LaurelRiek: 20% of the world’s population has a disability, as people age, they experience changes in their abilities. Most of the burden of long term care fall onto family members. Our goal is to use robots to help to relieve burden of care. #FutureofMedicine @UCSDalumni

— UCSD Engineering (@UCSDJacobs) June 3, 2018

.@LaurelRiek: When she was very small she watched #StarTrekTheNextGeneration and saw Data. She decided she wanted to build robots. 10 years ago decided that she was truly interested in robotics and healthcare, where you can make a difference for billions of people

— UCSD Engineering (@UCSDJacobs) June 3, 2018

.@LaurelRiek: Robotic patient simulators: every clinician will train of patient simulator at some point. But they don’t have any expressions. We’re trying to design tech to create expressive faces. They can simulate pain, strokes, etc.#FutureofMedicine @UCSDalumni weekend

— UCSD Engineering (@UCSDJacobs) June 3, 2018

Contextual #Robotics director @hiskov: There are all of these places where robotics can empower people to continue being autonomous. Robots will help people have a better quality of life. #FutureofMedicine @UCSDalumni weekend #ucsandiegorobotics @imagineUCSD

— UCSD Engineering (@UCSDJacobs) June 3, 2018

.@hiskov: We need to move away from this focus on screen devices. We need to have people have a more natural interaction with one another and with technology. #FutureofMedicine @UCSDalumni weekend #ucsandiegorobotics @imagineUCSD

— UCSD Engineering (@UCSDJacobs) June 3, 2018

Ramesh Rao, director of the Qualcomm Institute at UC San Diego, is also a professor
in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering. 

.@QI_UCSD director Rao: #AI needs to be more than just a black box. We need to figure out how the system comes to a decision. #FutureofMedicine @UCSDalumni weekend

— UCSD Engineering (@UCSDJacobs) June 3, 2018

#StarTrek actor @RobertPicardo "If you’re a SciFi fan, you’re a science fan, you just may not know it."
He sits on executive board of @exploreplanets led by @BillNye#FutureOfMedicine @UCSanDiego @UCSDnews @imagineUCSD

— UCSD Engineering (@UCSDJacobs) June 3, 2018

Hey! Guess who moderated a panel discussion on Future Medicine at UCSD School of Medicine tonight? https://t.co/kKwOF1tuC5

— Robert Picardo (@RobertPicardo) June 3, 2018

Future of medicine and the tricoder challenge. Impressive ideas pic.twitter.com/h0kzpFIvs5

— Henrik I Christensen (@hiskov) June 3, 2018

From the #FutureOfMedicine event tonight. Excellent panel on #robotics in #medicine with @hiskov, @LaurelRiek, and @QI_UCSD director Ramesh Rao and moderated by @RobertPicardo. @imagineUCSD @UCSDJacobs @UCSanDiego @UCSDalumni pic.twitter.com/PXfTSrHYzP

— Caleb Christianson (@omicScale) June 3, 2018

A model of the original tricoder used in the Star Trek series. 

It's about empowering people; it's not about replacing people: The future of robotics

"It's about empowering people. It's not about replacing people."
That's the message that Henrik Christensen, director of the Contextual Robotics Institute at UC San Diego, has been trying to spread about robotics and automation.
He spoke to Per Sjöborg from Robohub in an extensive interview.

Some highlights and predictions from the video:

"Robots are going to be pervasive in our lives going forward." That means researchers will need to figure out how to make it easy for everyone to interact with robots. "I want people who have never used a computer to be able to use this technology."

"One day we'll have robotic beds that will make sure you get adequate sleep."

"By the time I retire, I will have a self-driving car."

"We might have food that has never been touched by humans [only by robots]."

Video: Jacobs School computer scientist talks about the future of health care robotics

 UC San Diego computer scientist Laurel Riek wants to put a robot in someone's home for six months.
"We want to build robots that can adapt to learn from and change with a person, not only throughout the week, but throughout the day," she says in this video for the journal Communications of the ACM.
Riek is the author of a review article titled Healthcare Robotics in the journal's November 2017 issue.
The full text of the article is available here: https://cacm.acm.org/magazines/2017/11/222171-healthcare-robotics/fulltext
She is a professor of computer science at the Jacobs School of Engineering at UC San Diego and a faculty member of the campus' Contextual Robotics Institute.
Her research goal is to enable robots to robustly solve problems in dynamically- changing human environments. Riek is particularly focused on problems in real-world, safety-critical healthcare environments, such as hospitals, homes and clinics. Her work tackles the fundamental and applied problems that make complex, real-world perception and interaction in these spaces so challenging for robots. Riek’s work draws on techniques from the fields of computer vision, machine learning, non-linear dynamics, and human factors to enable robots to autonomously perceive, respond, and adapt to people in the real world.  

UC San Diego at RoboCup 2017

Darren Chen, a Ph.D. student in computer science at UC San Diego, had just landed in Japan when he saw ads in the subway for the competition he was going to take part in. "I realized it was a big deal," he said. He might even have panicked a little, he admitted.
In fact, the competition, called the RoboCup, brought more than 10,000 spectators and competitors to Nagoya, Japan at the end of July. The event, which is broadcast on Japanese TV, was celebrating its 20th anniversary. 
Chen was part of a team of Ph.D. students from the Contextual Robotics Institute here at the Jacobs School that was taking part in the event's RoboCup @ Home challenge. It was UC San Diego's first time taking part in the competition.
In the @ Home challenge, 10 universities from around the world compete to complete a series of tasks by programming and training a Toyota Human Support Robot. The UC San Diego team had to sort groceries and help a person carry grocery items.
 In addition, they faced a task to qualify. On the fly, they had to program the Toyota robot to autonomously navigate and map out a room without bumping into people and objects. The robot also had to be able to obey verbal commands in a noisy environment.
But the team's worst foe turned out to be the venue's WiFi. When 10,000 people were using the same radio band, it became difficult for the robot to communicate with other computers quickly.
The researchers enjoyed the experience of participating in the competition, and look forward to continuing to build assistive robots in the future.
In addition to Chen, the team working on the RoboCup @ Home challenge included   Angelique Taylor, Priyam Parashar  and Ruffin White as well master's student Jaskaran Virdi from the research groups of computer science professors Laurel Riek and Henrik Christensen. Christensen is the director of the Contextual Robotics Institute.
More info: http://jacobsschool.ucsd.edu/news/news_releases/release.sfe?id=2268

Two of the UC San Diego Ph.D. students taking part in the competition, as seen by the Toyota robot.

Darren Chen, center, and Angelique Taylor, right, are two Ph.D. students in the research group of Professor Laurel Riek. 

Taylor has some fun with the robots on exhibit at RoboCup.