Events Calendar

CS Colloquium: Holly Yanco (University of Massachusetts Lowell) - Designing for Human-Robot Interaction

Speaker: Holly Yanco, University of Massachusetts Lowell

Talk Title: Designing for Human-Robot Interaction

Series: Computer Science Colloquium

Abstract: Robots navigating in difficult and dynamic environments often need assistance from human operators or supervisors, either in the form of teleoperation or interventions when the robot's autonomy is not able to handle the current situation. Even in more controlled environments, such as office buildings and manufacturing floors, robots may need help from people. This talk will discuss methods for controlling both individual robots and groups of robots, in applications ranging from assistive technology to telepresence to search and rescue. A variety of modalities for human-robot interaction with robot systems, including multi-touch devices, software-based operator control units (softOCUs), game controllers, virtual reality headsets, and Google Glass, will be presented.

This lecture satisfies requirements for CSCI 591: Research Colloquium.


Biography: Dr. Holly Yanco is a Distinguished University Professor, Professor of Computer Science, and Director of the New England Robotics Validation and Experimentation (NERVE) Center at the University of Massachusetts Lowell. Her research interests include human-robot interaction, multi-touch computing, robot autonomy, fostering trust of autonomous systems, evaluation methods for robot systems, and the use of robots in K-12 education to broaden participation in computer science. Yanco's research has been funded by NSF, including a CAREER Award, ARO, DARPA, DOE-EM, NASA, NIST, Microsoft, and Google. Yanco is Co-Chair of the Massachusetts Technology Leadership Council's Robotics Cluster,served as Co-Chair of the Steering Committee for the ACM/IEEE Conference on Human-Robot Interaction and Journal of Human-Robot Interaction from 2013-2016, and was a member of the Executive Council of the Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence (AAAI) from 2006-2009. Yanco has a PhD in Computer Science from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.


Host: Maja Mataric

Location: Henry Salvatori Computer Science Center (SAL) - 101

Audiences: Everyone Is Invited

Contact: Computer Science Department