Events Calendar

CS Colloquium: Ankur Mehta (UCLA) - Towards $1 robots

Speaker: Ankur Mehta, University of California, Los Angeles

Talk Title: Towards $1 robots

Series: Computer Science Colloquium

Abstract: Note: *New time: 2:30PM-3:50PM PT*

Robots are pretty great -- they can make some hard tasks easy, some dangerous tasks safe, or some unthinkable tasks possible. And they're just plain fun to boot. But how many robots have you interacted with recently? And where do you think that puts you compared to the rest of the world's people?

In contrast to computation, automating physical interactions continues to be limited in scope and breadth. I'd like to change that. But in particular, I'd like to do so in a way that's accessible to everyone, everywhere. In our lab, we work to lower barriers to robotics design, creation, and operation through
material and mechanism design, computational tools, and mathematical analysis. We hope that with our efforts, everyone will be soon able to enjoy the benefits of robotics to work, to learn, and to play.

**Prof. Ankur Mehta will give his talk in person at SGM 124 and we will also host the talk over Zoom.**

Register in advance for this webinar at:

https://usc.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_dUyqi3ZTQiWuseUgfp4fYw

After registering, attendees will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the webinar.

This lecture satisfies requirements for CSCI 591: Research Colloquium.


Biography: Now, this is a story all about how
My life took me to where I am now
And I'd like to take a minute, just sit right there
I'll tell you how I became a prof at UCLA.

From East Pennsylvania born and raised
MIT is where I spent the next of my days
Getting my Masters and Bachelor's too
ECE is the field I did then pursue.

Then a couple of years until I finally would
From California, Berkeley get my doctor hood
I got in one lil' postdoc at MIT CSAIL
And then I moved to LA just south of Bel Air.

Prof. Ankur Mehta is an assistant professor of Electrical and computer Engineering at UCLA, and directs the Laboratory for Embedded Machines and Ubiquitous Robots (LEMUR). Pushing towards his visions of a future filled with robots, his research interests involve printable robotics, rapid design and
fabrication, control systems, and multi-agent networks. He has received the NSF CAREER award and a Samueli fellowship, and has received best paper awards in the IEEE Robotics & Automation Magazine and the International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS).

Prior to joining the UCLA faculty, Prof. Mehta was a postdoc at MIT's Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratories investigating design automation for printable robots. Before to that, he conducted research as a graduate student at UC Berkeley in wireless sensor networks and systems, small autonomous aerial robots and rockets, control systems, and micro-electro-mechanical systems (MEMS).

When not in the lab, Ankur enjoys puzzles, ultimate frisbee, board games.


Host: Stefanos Nikolaidis

Location: Seeley G. Mudd Building (SGM) - 124

Audiences: Everyone Is Invited

Contact: Computer Science Department