May 2026 - RoboCup-small - lists.robocup.org

RC2026 Tournament Structure and Awards
by David Brand 26 May '26

26 May '26

Hello, With the tournament now only being little more than a month away, we want to give you an info about this year's tournament structure. Sadly till this day, we do not know the general schedule of the tournament, such that we are currently planning around a rough idea of where each event could be. General Tournament Timeline Team Setup Days: Tuesday 30. June - Wednesday 1. July Competition: Thursday 2. - Sunday 5. July Symposium: Monday 6. July Tournament Style With the additional Division B field this year, we increased the maximum number of teams to 24 with 10 planned in Div A and 14 in Div B. Alongside that, we also adapted the tournament structure in both divisions. Due to the single field in Div A and the team registration still ongoing until June 2nd, we have currently still two different tournament options. Therefore, once the regular registration deadline has passed by, we will make an update to the [SSL grouping tool](https://github.com/RoboCup-SSL/ssl-grouping) on the day after and remove the teams which could not finish the team registration in time. For the Div A tournament the group phase will consist of two groups with either 4 or 5 teams. In case that all 9 teams, which we currently expect, finish their team registration, the elimination phase will involve the best 6 teams as part of a double elimination system, whereas in case of only 8 teams, we will be able to include all teams in the double elimination style elimination stage. For the Div B we are currently expecting 14 teams, leading to 4 groups, consisting of 3 or 4 teams. After the group phase we will have an intermediate stage, where we will determine the fifth to eighth best teams using a lucky looser round, where all of the second and third placed teams in each group will play against one team of another group. After that we will continue with 8 teams in a double elimination system. To get a better understanding of the tournament structures feel free to already take a look at both prepared schedules: [Schedule with 9 teams in Div A](https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1OLfcAZqEqS484hQ-zAwiyAP-CBwQgKJ-… [Schedule with 8 teams in Div A](https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/10Bn-sD_hUCrTsEl8_GaS2gz2lRjEQ3i4… Both schedules have the same structure for the Div B. Disclaimer: As the general RC schedule has not been confirmed yet, please see the times in the schedule only as a rough idea. Once the general events have been confirmed, we will send out an update. As in the previous years the teams will be drawn into groups using the [SSL grouping tool](https://github.com/RoboCup-SSL/ssl-grouping). We have already updated the seeding pools for this year's competition (including all teams where the registration hasn’t been finalized yet) . The seeds are primarily determined by [last year's results](https://ssl.robocup.org/robocups/robocup-2025/robocup-2025-results…, as well as the participation in previous RC tournaments. As there are three German and Japanese teams in the Div A, we have decided to ignore the country of origin for Div A again this year If you notice any issues with this seeding, please notify us before the 7th of July. This is important since we will draw groups on that day and we have a much harder time adjusting the seeding when the resulting groups are already available. As we always do, we will use random.org for the random seeds required for the tool. We will draw the groups using the pre-generated random numbers for the 7th of July (which will become available at https://www.random.org/integers/?num=4&min=1&max=10000&col=5&base=10&format… on that date) to seed our tool. (The first two numbers are used to seed Div A, and the last two to seed Div B) Awards The awards for this year can be found on the [homepage](https://ssl.robocup.org/robocups/robocup-2026/robocup-2026-awards… from now on and are the same as last year. To be considered for the Open Source Award, you must submit your submission until June 16th, AoE, which is two weeks before the start of the tournament, to give all teams the option to review the submissions. In line with last year all teams, who received at least one nomination for the Best (E)TDP Award during the review process and participated in the RC2026, will be eligible. For now this includes the following teams (in a random order): - The Bots - UBC Thunderbots - RobôCIn - KIKS - GreenTea - Ri-one - Warthog Robotics - RoboJackets - TIGERs Mannheim - Traps - ER-Force - luhbots Please take your time and read the (E)TDPs again, so that you can vote for your top three choices during the RoboCup. In case of any questions, please feel free to reach out to any committee member. Thank you, David. ------------ RoboCup Small Size League | OC Member

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Quori Community Gathering @ ICRA 2026
by Ross Mead 24 May '26

24 May '26

Hello colleagues! We are planning an informal, in-person gathering sometime June 1-5 (TBD) at ICRA 2026 in Vienna, Austria for current and prospective members of the Quori robotics community. All are welcome! Quori is an NSF-funded, not-for-profit, open-everything, modular, social robot platform for the robotics research community (https://quori.org). The gathering at ICRA will serve as an opportunity to meet with colleagues interested in the Quori robot platform and to network with other researchers interested in human-robot interaction and general robotics. Please RSVP to the Google Form HERE <https://forms.gle/B4VKQE3tQuf2gkUD8> to express your interest and availability, and we’ll get back to you ASAP with a proposed time and location. You are encouraged to forward this to anyone you think might be interested in Quori. Additionally, we will also host a virtual meeting shortly after ICRA 2026 for the broader Quori community. At the virtual meeting, we will (1) provide Quori development updates; (2) invite research groups to optionally share a summary of their ICRA presentations; and (3) outline plans for cost, timeline, and distribution of Quori units. We will follow up with more information. Please let us know if you have any questions or comments. Thanks and we hope to see you at ICRA 2026 and/or at the Quori community virtual meeting! -- The Quori Project Team * Ross Mead (Semio) * Bill Smart (Oregon State University) * Mark Yim (University of Pennsylvania) * Simon Kim (University of Pennsylvania) * Naomi Fitter (Oregon State University)

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Technical Challenges, additional minor rule updates, used vision system
by David Brand 21 May '26

21 May '26

Hi, We are very sorry for the current delay with the RoboCup related announcements. But hopefully everything is finally figured out and we can therefore start to send you a mail every week. Therefore, if you have not already done it, it might now be a good time to join the [SSL mailing list](https://lists.robocup.org/mm/lists/robocup-small.lists.robocup.org/). Radio Communications Challenge To reduce the entry barrier for new teams, we want to provide a list of known good radio solutions. Therefore we want to encourage teams to open-source their solution and offer quantitative metrics on which the different solutions can be compared. The goal of this is not to seek one mandated solution, but rather help teams develop and implement reliable radio solutions to reduce the complexity and enhance the gameplay. To get to know more about the challenge and how to participate, please take a look at the rules for the challenge: [HMTL](https://robocup-ssl.github.io/technical-challenge-rules/2026-radio-communications-challenge.html)/[PDF](https://robocup-ssl.github.io/technical-challenge-rules/2026-radio-communications-challenge.pdf) SSL RCJ Soccer Junior Cooperation Challenge As an experiment this year, we will also be hosting a joint Technical Challenge in collaboration with RoboCup Junior Soccer. For this challenge, participating teams will be randomly paired, combining one Major and one Junior team. Both teams will then need to work together to complete the challenge. Due to the nature of Technical Challenges in RCJ, the task and its ruleset will only be published at the start of the tournament. Therefore the evaluation will take place on Saturday. Although this is a normal competition day with matches taking place, we will do our best to ensure that the time of your evaluation slot does not conflict with any matches or the preparation time beforehand. If you would like to participate in the challenge, please fill out the participation intent here: https://forms.gle/az63vys8jpErBj9e6 Filling out the form is not binding, but helps us optimize this year's schedule and the details of the challenge. Rule Changes In addition to the [new submission area in Div A](https://robocup-ssl.github.io/ssl-rules/sslrules-diff.html#_robot_substitution) we sadly missed three minor rule changes in the last mail, where the wording or names got improved: - [Robot Height:](https://robocup-ssl.github.io/ssl-rules/sslrules-diff.html#_shape) As the vision system cannot handle robots of the same team having too different heights, the requirement of them not differing by more than 0.02 m from each other was added. - [Renaming Emergency Stop:](https://robocup-ssl.github.io/ssl-rules/sslrules-diff.html#_forced_timeout)Due to misunderstandings caused by its name, the Emergency Stop has been renamed to Forced Timeout, with the functionality remaining the same. - [Vision Systems:](https://robocup-ssl.github.io/ssl-rules/sslrules-diff.html#_vision) To allow competitions to decide for themself which vision system they want to use at a tournament, the explicit wording regarding the ssl-vision project has been updated. Available vision system(s) As we are currently still in a transition phase between the [SSL-Vision](https://github.com/RoboCup-SSL/ssl-vision) and the new [vision-processor](https://github.com/TIGERs-Mannheim/vision-processor), the decision has been made that we will continue to offer SSL-Vision as default vision system on all fields for this year. In addition to that, we will also offer the vision-processor on the Div A field, as well as one of three Div-B fields. Nonetheless we currently plan to switch to the vision-processor as default for RC27 and probably will not offer the SSL-Vision system as a backup option there. Therefore please make yourself familiar with the vision-processor until the end of this year's RC, as we would like to take the chance and speak about current hurdles regarding a vision-processor implementation at this year's Open TC/OC meeting and the roadmap for coming improvements. In case of any questions regarding the included announcements, please feel free to contact any of us. Thank you, David and Will. On behalf of the SSL OC and TC.

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[CFP] Call for Workshops & Tutorials: Humanoids 2026 Conference
by Ross Mead 08 May '26

08 May '26

CALL FOR WORKSHOPS & TUTORIALS: - What: 2026 IEEE RAS International Conference on Humanoid Robots - When: December 6-9, 2026 - Where: Santa Clara, California, USA - Web: https://2026.ieee-humanoids.org — IMPORTANT DATES: - Aug. 3, 2026: Workshop/tutorial proposal deadline - Sep. 28, 2026: Notification of workshop/tutorial acceptance/rejection - Dec. 7, 2026: Humanoids 2026 workshops/tutorials — Dear colleagues, We are very pleased to invite you to contribute proposals for half-day or full-day workshops/tutorials to the 2026 IEEE RAS International Conference on Humanoid Robots to be held December 6-9, 2026 in Santa Clara, California, USA. WORKSHOPS & TUTORIALS: The workshop and tutorial sessions are aimed at exploring the frontiers of recent or emerging topics related to humanoid robotics, with relevant topics detailed below. We encourage workshops and tutorials that will promote exchanges and interactions between presenters and participants. Proposals with a diverse set of speakers, including a balance between (i) junior and senior presenters, (ii) genders, (iii) geographic location, (iv) race and ethnicity, and (v) industry and academia, will be preferred. OVERVIEW: Humanoids 2026 aims at bringing together top researchers from humanoid robotics and related disciplines with leading companies in the field. In light of a year of rapidly evolving humanoid technologies with several new platforms coming onto the market and bringing us closer to a wider real-world deployment. Our community envisions innovative areas in humanoid robotics that lie at the intersection of general-purpose physical, cognitive, and motor capabilities, while also considering the scientific understanding of interactions with humanoid and anthropomorphic systems. SCHEDULE: The conference will be organized as a 4-day event opening on December 6th (Sunday) with public panels, seminars, and hackathons, followed by workshops and tutorials on December 7th (Monday), followed by 2 days December 8th-9th (Tuesday-Wednesday) for the main conference with plenaries, keynotes, oral and interactive sessions, and industry events. A centrally located exhibition will feature the latest humanoid technology from both industry and academia. TOPICS: We invite workshops/tutorials in all areas related to humanoid robotics, including, but not limited to: - Human biomechanics and motor control, human body and behavior modeling - Bionic / human-inspired design principles for humanoids - Human-inspired robot control - Whole-body dynamics and control - Optimization, optimal control, and model predictive control methods - Learning methods for humanoid robots - Robot modeling for locomotion and/or manipulation - Exoskeleton / wearable robot design and control - Prosthesis design and control - Physical and social human-humanoid interaction - Dynamic legged locomotion (bipeds, quadrupeds, etc.) - Loco-manipulation, legged manipulation - Dual arm dexterous manipulation - Design, control, and application of multi-finger hands - Stability and robustness of humanoid and legged robots and humans - Simulation and physics-based animations from computer graphics - Humanoid heads and faces, geminoids - Novel materials, mechanisms, and actuators for humanoids - Perception for humanoids - Human-centered robotic studies and applications - Neuro-robotics and brain-robot interfaces for humanoids and humans - Real-world applications for humanoid robots (industry, healthcare, home, space, disaster response) - Benchmarks, performance indicators for humanoid robots - Ethical and social challenges of humanoid robot deployment - Long-term deployment of humanoid, bipedal, or dual arm manipulation robots EXHIBITION: Industry leaders are eager to see your organization’s latest developments, connect, learn, and collaborate. Don’t miss this opportunity to make a strong, in-person impression. For more information contact Hall-Erickson, Inc: humanoids(a)heiexpo.com <HUMANOIDS(a)heiexpo.com> MORE INFORMATION: For more information, please visit the conference contributions webpage ( https://2026.ieee-humanoids.org/call-for-workshops-and-tutorials) or contact the Workshop Chairs: Enrico Mingo Hoffman, Yan Gu, and Rafael Cisneros-Limón (humanoids2026-wt(a)ieee.org). We look forward to your contributions to Humanoids 2026! — The Humanoids 2026 General Chairs: - Andra Keay (Silicon Valley Robotics) - Ross Mead (Semio)

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