March 2022 - RoboCup-worldwide

[meetings] (RO-MAN 2022) EXTENDED DEALINE for regular and special sessions papers at the 31st IEEE International Conference on Robot & Human Interactive Communication
by Alessandra Rossi 15 Mar '22

15 Mar '22

Dear colleagues, Due to the multiple requests, we decided to extend the deadline for regular and special session papers for RO-MAN 2022. The new deadline is March 25, 2022. There will not be granted any further extension. We look forward to seeing you in Naples. More information can be also found on the website and social media: ro-man2022.org IG: @ieeeroman2022 Twitter: @ROMAN2022ieee Facebook: @ieeeroman2022 For any questions and further information about the Regular and Special Session papers, please email program(at)ro-man2022.org Best regards, Alessandra Dr. Alessandra Rossi Assistant Professor PRISCA research lab Department of Electrical Engineering and Information Technology University of Naples Federico II, Naples, Italy ================================================================================== *** LAST CALL FOR REGULAR PAPERS and SPECIAL SESSIONS PAPERS *** 31st IEEE International Conference on Robot & Human Interactive Communication (RO-MAN 2022) August 29th - September 2nd, 2022 Naples, Italy ro-man2022.org IG: @ieeeroman2022 Twitter: @ROMAN2022ieee Facebook: @ieeeroman2022 ================================================================================== REGULAR PAPERS and SPECIAL SESSIONS PAPERS IMPORTANT DATES SUBMISSION DEADLINE: MARCH 25, 2022 NOTIFICATION OF ACCEPTANCE: MAY 30, 2022 CAMERA-READY DEADLINE: JUNE 15, 2022 The RO-MAN2022 Organising Committee invites for the submission of Regular Papers and Special Session Papers to be held during the 31st IEEE International Conference on Robot & Human Interactive Communication in Naples, Italy from August 29th to September 2nd, 2022. The RO-MAN conference is a leading forum where state-of-the-art innovative results, the latest developments as well as future perspectives relating to robot and human interactive communication are presented and discussed. The conference covers a wide range of topics related to Robot and Human Interactive Communication, involving theories, methodologies, technologies, empirical and experimental studies. Proposals related to the study of robotic technology, psychology, cognitive science, artificial intelligence, human factors, ethics and policies, interaction-based robot design and other topics related to human-robot interaction are welcome. This year's theme is “Social, asocial, and antisocial robots”. One of its goals is to explore how to create robots that are capable of being welcomed as our assistants and companions in society while, at the same time, not being perceived as “asocial” or “antisocial”. A second aim is to understand how we can create robots perceived as facilitators of the natural development of human beings and communities, rather than obstacles. TEMPLATES AND SUBMISSION PROCEDURE Authors should submit their papers electronically in PDF format via Papercept. For the first submission, a manuscript can be of 6-8 pages including references. For the final submission, a manuscript should be of 6 pages, with 2 additional pages allowed at an extra charge. All papers submitted to RO-MAN 2022 will undergo a peer-review process. A manuscript will be reviewed by at least two reviewers, who will provide detailed comments. If the submission is accepted, the authors submit a revised “camera-ready” version that takes into account this feedback. The review process is managed by the program chair, the program co-chairs, the editors, and the conference associate editors. All papers are reviewed using a single-blind review process: authors declare their names and affiliations in the manuscript for the reviewers to see, but reviewers do not know each other’s identities, nor do the authors receive information about who has reviewed their manuscript. Authors will have to declare that the research presented in the submitted papers complies with the IEEE Code of Ethics. Authors should use the templates provided by the electronic submission system. The templates for US Letter format paper should be used. The manuscript submission website will require that you submit your abstract and make any final changes to the author list and title of the paper before uploading the paper. Use the following templates to create the paper and generate or export a PDF file: LaTeX or MS-Word. All authors and co-authors must be registered in the electronic system. It is the corresponding author’s responsibility to ensure that the complete author list and the correct title are being entered. This information will be used for the conference program and the proceedings. AUTHORS SHOULD ADHERE TO THE FOLLOWING STEPS FOR SUBMITTING THE PAPER (FOR INITIAL SUBMISSION): • Create an account: go to https://ras.papercept.net/, then PIN and fill out the form. Ask all your co-authors to do the same if they do not have an account on the system yet, write down the authors' PINs (this information is needed for manuscript processing purposes). • Go to Support Menu and depending on how you are preparing your paper, download a template: LaTeX or MS-Word, Use these templates/style files to create the paper and save in PDF format. • Upload the paper as pdf: go to https://ras.papercept.net/ and click on "Submit a contribution to RO-MAN 2022". • Submit (regular paper, special session paper). • Fill in the form presented on the next page (make sure to enter all author PINs created in Step 1). SPECIAL ISSUE ON RO-MAN 2022 CONFERENCE Best papers will be invited to submit an extended/revised version to a Special Issue of RSJ International Journal of Advanced Robotics. For any concerns about Full Papers preparation, submission and review process, please contact program(at)ro-man2022.org. PC CO-CHAIRS Nak Young Chong, JAIST (JP) Mary Ellen Foster, University of Glasgow (UK) Gentiane Venture, Tokyo University of Agriculture and Technology (JP)

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[RC-Humanoid League Virtual Season] Call for Workshop proposals on sim2real transfer
by Alessandra Rossi 14 Mar '22

14 Mar '22

Dear RoboCuppers, The Technical and Virtual Organising committees of the Humanoid League invite proposals for Workshops that will be held as part of the Humanoid League Virtual Season on April, 28-30, 2022. The event will be fully online and free of attendance. The theme of this three-days event is sim2real transfer. In particular, we want to teams the opportunity to share their knowledge and experiences of applying realistic computational resources and scenario to the virtual competition, and the other way around. A second aim is too have a specific roundtable to talk about possible ideas for collaboration between the 3Dsim and the Humanoid League. However, inputs and contributions from different leagues are valuable and appreciated. The event will be organised through different time-zones to allow the participations from all over the world. Detailed schedule of the event will be posted on the website of the Humanoid League email and social media. Website: https://humanoid.robocup.org/ Twitter: @HumanoidLRC IMPORTANT DATES Proposal Submission deadline: April 8, 2022 (AoE) Workshop days: April, 28-30, 2022. HOW TO SUBMIT We are welcoming workshop proposals related to the sim2real topic from teams of the different RC leagues. Each workshop will be of half hour. Teams can submit more than one proposal, but they need to provide separate submissions. Prospective workshop organisers are invited to submit a proposal in a PDF format via https://cloud.robocup.org/s/CrqjiD3DdscRKcg Proposals should include the following information: • Workshop title • Short description of topic and objective of the workshop • Organisers names, email and affiliation For any questions and further information about the Workshop proposal and the event, please email rc-hl-tc <AT> lists.robocup.org or rc-hl-oc <AT> lists.robocup.org Alessandra On behalf of the Humanoid League TC and V-OC committees Dr. Alessandra Rossi Assistant Professor PRISCA research lab Department of Electrical Engineering and Information Technology University of Naples Federico II, Naples, Italy

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Call for Participation: RoboCup@Home Education Workshop & Challenge 2022 (Online & On-site)
by Jeffrey Tan 10 Mar '22

10 Mar '22

Dear RoboCup Community, After two years of online events, finally we are organizing an on-site RoboCup@Home Education Challenge event at the RoboCup 2022 Bangkok in July 2022. The event will run in both online and on-site tracks, comprising a series of robot building short courses for beginners via online classroom with live streaming of remote participation online challenge, and on-site hands-on workshop with face-to-face participation on-site competition in Bangkok. We hope everyone around the world can join us together in RoboCup development and challenges regardless of travel restrictions. With that, we are proud to announce the RoboCup@Home Education Workshop & Challenge 2022! The event details are as follows in the Call for Participation announcement. We are organizing a Kick-Off Webinar on March 16, 2022 to give an overview of the event. << Kick-Off Webinar 2022 >> Date and Time: - March 16, 2022 (Wed) 21:00~22:30 (GMT+8 China/Malaysia) - March 16, 2022 (Wed) 08:00~09:30 (EST New York) - March 16, 2022 (Wed) 14:00~15:30 (CET Italy/France) Join online: https://forms.office.com/r/F1FwGkdLkK === Call for Participation: RoboCup@Home Education Workshop & Challenge 2022 === [ Venue ] Online & On-site (Thailand) [ Date ] RoboCup 2022 Bangkok July 11 ~ 17, 2022 [ Web ] https://www.robocupathomeedu.org/challenges/robocup-2022-bangkok << Supported by >> - RoboCup Federation - RoboCup 2022 LOC << Sponsors and Technical Partners >> - SoftBank Robotics - Jupiter Robot << Schedule and Rules >> - Kick-Off Webinar: March 16, 2022 - Online Classroom: April ~ May 2022 - Technical Materials Submission: May 27, 2022 - RoboCup 2022 Bangkok: July 11 ~ 17, 2022 For the competition rules, please visit https://www.robocupathomeedu.org/rules << Categories >> Open Platform (OP) - Custom Build Robots Standard Platform (SP) - SoftBank Pepper Robot << How to Participate >> Step 0 - Intend To Participate (Entry Application) Step 1 - Kick-Off Webinar Step 2 - Online Classroom Step 3 - Technical Review & Challenge Step 4 (Online) - Online Challenge (Finals) Step 4 (On-site) - On-site Workshop & Challenge For more details, please visit https://www.robocupathomeedu.org/challenges/robocup-2022-bangkok You can contact us via oc(a)robocupathomeedu.org Best regards, RoboCup@Home Education Workshop & Challenge 2022 Organizing Committee

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[meetings][cfp](RO-MAN 2022) Special Session on Theory of Mind for social HRI
by Alessandra Rossi 08 Mar '22

08 Mar '22

Dear colleagues, This is a kind reminder of the approaching deadline for submitting your works at the special session on Theory of Mind for social HRI that will be held in conjunction with the IEEE RO-MAN conference in the beautiful Naples, Italy. The special session aims to define and explore the needed level of shared mental models between people and robots for effectively planning, navigating, manipulating objects and the environment, and transparently communicating. We welcome submissions from experts in the fields of Theory of Mind, cognitive and behavioural robotics, and social HRI. Please find attached below the call for papers. For any questions and information, do not hesitate to contact us (emails below). Kind regards, Alessandra Dr. Alessandra Rossi Assistant Professor PRISCA research lab Department of Electrical Engineering and Information Technology University of Naples Federico II, Naples, Italy ================================================================================== *** SPECIAL SESSION Theory of Mind for social HRI *** Submission Code: 1y123 31st IEEE International Conference on Robot & Human Interactive Communication (RO-MAN 2022) August 29th - September 2nd, 2022 Naples, Italy http://ro-man2022.org The ability of understanding and acknowledging others' mental states is known as Theory of Mind (ToM). Theory of Mind is a multi-modal system used by people to naturally communicate and understand each other. A growing group of Human-Robot Interaction (HRI) research focuses on investigating whether people form ToM towards robots, and what level of ToM a robot should have to communicate transparently with the humans in their shared environment in a sociable and accepted way. In this session, we want to probe deeper in the principal lines that can contribute towards this research direction. In particular, we aim to define and explore the needed level of shared mental models between people and robots for effectively planning, navigating, manipulating objects and the environment, and transparently communicating. The topics covered in this special session include, but are not limited to: • Cognitive robotics • Mental models in HRI • Robot etiquette • Theory of Mind in HRI • XAI in HRI • Cooperation and collaboration in human-robot teams • Detection and understanding human activity • Monitoring of behaviour and internal states of humans • Motion planning and navigation in human-centred environments • Multi-modal situation awareness and spatial cognition • Social intelligence for robots in interactive and non-interactive tasks TEMPLATES AND SUBMISSION PROCEDURE Authors should submit their papers electronically in PDF format via Papercept using the code for the special issue: 1y123 For the first submission, a manuscript can be of 6-8 pages including references. For the final submission, a manuscript should be of 6 pages, with 2 additional pages allowed at an extra charge. Authors will have to declare that the research presented in the submitted papers complies with the IEEE Code of Ethics. Authors should use the templates provided by the electronic submission system. The templates for US Letter format paper should be used. The manuscript submission website will require that you submit your abstract and make any final changes to the author list and title of the paper before uploading the paper. Use the following templates to create the paper and generate or export a PDF file: LaTeX or MS-Word. ORGANISERS Dr. Alessandra Rossi, University of Naples Federico II (IT), alessandra.rossi(a)unina.it Dr. Patrick Holthaus, University of Hertfordshire (UK), p.holthaus(a)herts.ac.uk Dr. Shruti Chandra, University of Waterloo (CA), shruti.chandra(a)uwaterloo.ca

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HRI workshop on Robot Curiosity in Human Robot Interaction - Fee Waiver Program
by Daniel Polani 05 Mar '22

05 Mar '22

Dear colleagues, We would like to invite you for the Human-Robot Interaction (HRI) 2022 Workshop on Robot Curiosity in Human-Robot Interaction (RCHRI). Note that we are introducing a fee waiver program for equity, diversity, and inclusion (EDI) at our workshop on Robot Curiosity in Human-Robot Interaction at HRI 2022. The fee waiver program is sponsored by Google. Please see below for details. ** Our apologies for cross postings ** =============================================================================== HRI 2022 Workshop on Robot Curiosity in Human-Robot Interaction (RCHRI) =============================================================================== Website: https://sites.google.com/view/rchri/home Date & Time: 09:00 AM - 06:00 PM (EST) on March 7, 2022 Location: Virtual, as part of the 17th ACM/IEEE International Conference on Human-Robot Interaction (HRI 2022) Contact for inquiries: Ali Ayub (a9ayub(a)uwaterloo.ca) =============================================================================== Fee Waiver Program =============================================================================== Our goal is to make RCHRI inclusive and accessible to all. Towards this goal we are introducing a fee waiver program for 1st time participants at RCHRI from countries, institutions, or populations that may have difficulty attending our workshop (and the HRI main conference) due to special circumstances. This program would waive the registration fee for the HRI main conference and the RCHRI workshop. Eligibility Criteria: First time attendee to RCHRI, who may or may not have a paper accepted. Attending university (BS, MS, PhD, Researcher, Postdoc) in countries listed in Band A or additional countries. Have some special circumstances that restrict you from having the means to attend or afford the conference (e.g., do not have sufficient income, are retired, unemployed, permanently disabled, or other). Categories are taken from https://www.ieee.org/membership/special-circumstances.html but are not limited to these. Fee waivers will be granted on a first-come, first-served basis, subject to budget availability. The deadline for application is March 06th. Applicants can apply by filling out this form: https://forms.gle/WKffXoTKTbPY4rCT9 =============================================================================== Aim and Scope of the Workshop =============================================================================== One of the fundamental modes of learning in children is through curiosity. Children (and adults) interact with new people, learn about novel objects, activities and other stimuli through curiosity and other intrinsic motivations. Creating autonomous robots that learn continually through intrinsic curiosity may result in breakthroughs in artificial intelligence. Such robots could continue to learn about themselves and the world around them through curiosity, thus improving their abilities over their ‘lifetime’. Although recent works on curiosity in different fields have produced significant results, most of these works have focused on constrained simulated environments which do not involve human interaction. However, in real-world applications such as healthcare, home-assistance etc., robots generally have to interact with humans on a regular basis. In these scenarios, it is imperative that curiosity is directed towards seeking out and learning important information from the humans when needed rather than simply learning in an unsupervised manner. Further, there is limited work on how humans perceive such curious robots and whether humans prefer curious robots that adapt over time to other robots that simply perform their assigned tasks. In this workshop, our goal is to bring together researchers and practitioners in different multidisciplinary fields to discuss the role of robot curiosity in real-world applications and its implications in human-robot interaction (HRI). =============================================================================== Confirmed Keynotes & Panelists =============================================================================== • Edith Law, University of Waterloo • Maya Cakmak, University of Washington • Georg Martius, Max Planck Institute for Intelligent Systems • Christoph Salge, University of Hertfordshire • Goren Gordon, Tel-Aviv University =============================================================================== Organizers =============================================================================== • Ali Ayub, University of Waterloo • Marcus Scheunemann, University of Hertfordshire • Christoforos Mavrogiannis University of Washington • Jimin Rhim, McGill University • Kerstin Dautenhahn, University of Waterloo • Verena Hafner, Humboldt-Universitat Berlin • Chrystopher Nehaniv, University of Waterloo • Daniel Polani, University of Hertfordshire =============================================================================== Contact =============================================================================== For questions about submissions, please contact: Ali Ayub (a9ayub(a)uwaterloo.ca)

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Call for Participation: 2022 RoboCup Autonomous Robot Manipulation Challenge
by April Foster 04 Mar '22

04 Mar '22

Call for Participation 2022 RoboCup Autonomous Robot Manipulation (ARM) Challenge Supported by MathWorks https://arm.robocup.org <https://arm.robocup.org?trk=public_post_share-update_update-text>/ The RoboCup Autonomous Manipulation Challenge is live and accepting registrations for the 2022 season. This is a great opportunity to learn about robot manipulation or get a certificate to demonstrate your existing skills! Live information session on learning robotic manipulation and this competition will take place on March 15th, on the MATLAB Instagram Channel <https://www.instagram.com/matlab/>. <https://www.instagram.com/matlab/> Prizes ===== Certificate of Achievement for demonstrating skills in programming, control, simulation, and perception of robotic pick-and-place and grasping applications in dynamic environments. RCF Sponsored Research Grant for 2023 (Up to 5000 USD) Important Dates ============ January 18th – Registration Opens March 15th - Instagram Live Robot Manipulation Q&A and Challenge Kickoff at 9:30am EST through the MATLAB Instagram Channel <https://www.instagram.com/matlab/> April 12th - Technical Support and Development Q&A for teams May 22nd – Submission deadline for the qualification round May 30th – Announcement of teams qualified for finals June 19th – Second submission deadline for teams qualified to finals TBD – Final round simulations and announcement of winners Registration ========= All teams must pre-register using this form <https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLScA6JcHRV1qmh_-VWikgCfj62jg-GcQYgQ…> . - Teams already registered for any RoboCup league (either Major or Junior) can participate in this challenge with no additional fees - Teams willing to participate only in this challenge can register according to RoboCupJunior fees. Registration deadline: May 23rd, 2022 - Questions about registration? april.robocup(a)gmail.com Submission ========= Participating teams will complete a submission form providing links to their code/files and a video of their algorithm in action. Additional Information =============== - MathWorks support for RoboCup (Complimentary MATLAB licenses) <https://www.mathworks.com/academia/student-competitions/robocup.html> - Templates for RoboCup Virtual Robot Manipulation Challenge <https://github.com/mathworks-robotics/templates-robocup-robot-manipulation-…> - Questions about MATLAB and Simulink? Email: roboticsarena(a)mathworks.com - F.A.Q <https://2021.robocup.org/robot-manipulation/robot-manipulation-faq> .

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