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August 9th, 2013

Robots: Drone Journalism - Transcript

In this episode, we speak with Matthew Schroyer, founder of DroneJournalism.org, co-founder of Drones for Good, and developer of the “Drones for Schools” program which teaches students to design, fabricate and program unmanned aerial systems to monitor the environment.

Matthew Schroyer
Matthew Schroyer has a Master’s in journalism from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign where he works on the National Science Foundation grant EnLiST, which offers entrepreneurial leadership training and professional development for K-12 STEM teachers. At EnLiST he uses drones to motivate students to pursue STEM careers.

Driven by the maker movement, safety concerns for journalists, and the promise of cutting edge information, Schroyer founded the Professional Society of Drone Journalists (PSDJ). His drones are used for the common good and a clear code of ethics was written to avoid privacy and safety concerns. Along the same lines, Schroyer cofounded Drones for Good, which aims to show the positive side of drone technology through public engagement and the advancement of positive drone projects.

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July 26th, 2013

Robots: Outdoor Autonomous Systems

In this episode, we speak with Jonathan Roberts, research director of the Autonomous Systems Lab at the CSIRO ICT Centre in Brisbane Australia. Roberts leads a team of more than 45 scientists and engineers in wide variety of robotics and automation projects that feature flying, ground and underwater robots.

Jonathan Roberts
Jonathan Roberts is research director of Autonomous Systems Lab at CSIRO ICT Centre in Brisbane Outside CSIRO. His laboratory is developing automation technologies for applications in environmental monitoring, agriculture, mining, manufacturing, and for the energy sector. With research in field robotics and wireless sensor networks, his laboratory has produced new techniques for the autonomous control of machines, 3D perception and localisation, and for the setup and operation of large scale outdoor wireless sensor networks. These techniques are combined to produce novel solutions for industry.

In today’s episode we will touch on the following topics:

  • UAV Outback Challenge – an Australian UAV competition that features delivery and search and rescue missions.
  • Telepresence Robot – to help connect school kids and visitors in regional areas to the National Museum of Australia.
  • The Stealth Robot – for observing animals in their natural habitat.
  • StarBug AUV – an inexpensive, miniature autonomous underwater vehicle ideal for data collection and ecosystem surveys.
  • Robot Helicopter – an unmanned automatic helicopter designed to remotely inspect dangerous or hard to get to infrastructure such as powerlines, buildings and bridges.
  • Hexapod Robot – a multi-legged robot that can be used for monitoring and mapping uneven and unstructured terrain which can be difficult to navigate with wheeled robots.
  • Redirecting Manufacturing – a discussion on the future of manufacturing.

Jonathan Roberts is also Deputy Director of the Australian Research Centre for Aerospace Automation (ARCAA), Video Editor for the IEEE Robotics and Automation Magazine and a member of the editorial board of the International Journal of Field Robotics.

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May 31st, 2013

Robots: Curved Artificial Compound Eye

In this episode, we speak with Ramon Pericet and Michal Dobrzynski from EPFL about their Curved Artificial Compound Eye (CurvACE) published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. Inspired by the fly’s vision system, their sensor can enable a large range of applications that require motion detection using a small plug-and-play device. As shown in the video below, you could use these sensors to control small robots navigating an environment, even in the dark, or equip a small autonomous flying robot with limited payload. Other applications include home automation, surveillance, medical instruments, prosthetic devices, and smart clothing.


The artificial compound eye features a panoramic, hemispherical field of view with a resolution identical to that of the fruitfly in less than 1 mm thickness. Additionally, it can extract images 3 times faster than a fruitfly, and includes neuromorphic photoreceptors that allow motion perception in a wide range of environments from a sunny day to moon light. To build the sensors, the researchers align an array of microlenses, an array of photodetectors, and a flexible PCB that mechanically supports and electrically connects the ensemble.

This work is part of the European Project Curvace which brings together a total of 15 people from four partners in France, Germany and Switzerland.

You can read our full coverage about this new sensor on Robohub.

Ramon Pericet Camara
Ramon Pericet Camara is the scientific coordinator for the CurvACE project and a postdoctoral researcher at the Laboratory of Intelligent Systems at EPFL. His research interests are oriented towards bio-inspired robotics, soft robotics, and soft-condensed matter physics.

Ramon received a Masters degree in Physics in 2000 from the University of Granada (Spain) and a PhD in Multidisciplinary Research from the University of Geneva (Switzerland) in 2006. Subsequently, he was granted a fellowship for prospective researchers from the Swiss National Science Foundation to join the Max Planck Institute for Polymer Research in Mainz (Germany).

Michal Dobrzynski
Michal Dobrzynski is a PhD student at the Laboratory of Intelligent Systems at EPFL. He obtained his master degree in Automatic Control and Robotics in 2006 from the Warsaw Technical University (Poland). He then joined the SGAR S.L. Company (Barcelona, Spain) as a Robot and PLC Software Engineer where his work focused on industrial robots and automatic lines programming and visualization. Next, in 2007, he joined a Numerical Method Laboratory at the University Politechnica of Bucharest (Romania) where he spent two years working in the FP6 “Early Stage Training 3″ project as a Researcher.




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May 3rd, 2013

Robots: Controlled Flight of Insect-sized Robots

In this episode we hear from researchers at the Harvard Microrobotics Lab about the Science paper published today reporting on the first controlled flight of an insect-sized robot. The amazing high-speed video below shows the robot taking off, hovering in place and steering left and right. This work is part of the Robobees project that aims to make swarms of insect robots. You can read our full coverage on Robohub.




Kevin Ma, Pakpong Chirarattananon and Sawyer Fuller
Kevin Ma and Pakpong Chirarattananon are graduate student researcher at the Harvard Microrobotics Lab working with Prof. Robert Wood (listen to Wood’s podcast here). Kevin studies the design and manufacturing of very small-scale robots while Pakpong’s work focuses on flight control strategies for flapping wing robots. Sawyer Fuller is a postdoctoral researcher with experience in the control and sensing of biological and robotic flies.

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August 10th, 2012

Robots: Field Robotics - Transcript

In this episode, we talk to Salah Sukkarieh, Director of Research and Innovation at the Australian Centre for Field Robotics (ACFR). He gives us an overview of the centre’s past and present projects, many addressing the special conditions robotics faces in Australia.

Salah Sukkarieh

Salah Sukkarieh is the Director of Research and Innovation of the Australian Centre for Field Robotics (ACFR) and the Professor of Robotics and Intelligent Systems at the University of Sydney in the School of Aerospace. He received his Honours in BE Mechatronics Engineering in 1997 and his PhD in 2000 at the University of Sydney.

Field robotics focuses on systems that work in outdoor environments. Having been the principal research and development lead on many of the autonomous systems projects, Sukkarieh tells us about work done at the ACFR in aerospace, aviation, agriculture, mining and autonomous transport. Given the ripeness of the field, he also tells us about remaining future work and the potential for collaborations with industry.

For more information, visit the centre’s youtube channel.

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