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RoboCup International Symposium -- New Submission Date
by Josiah Hanna 22 Jan '24

22 Jan '24

Call for papers – NEW SUBMISSION DATE. RoboCup International Symposium 2024 https://2024.robocup.org/?page_id=2734 Monday 22 July 2024 Eindhoven, Netherlands. The 27th RoboCup International Symposium will be held on 22 July 2024, in conjunction with RoboCup 2024 (15 July to 21 July 2024), in Eindhoven, The Netherlands. We call for submissions of papers reporting innovative, original research with relevance to areas of robotics and artificial intelligence as listed below. Within the described scope of topics, we also encourage submissions of high-quality overview articles, papers describing real-world research, and papers reporting theoretical results. Researchers are invited to submit their work independently of whether they participate in the RoboCup competitions or have a RoboCup team. The symposium will be held in person at the Evoluon Conference Center in Eindhoven. In addition to the regular track with regular research papers, there is the development track encouraging reports on innovative hardware developments, software frameworks, and open- source releases of software components. A review of papers describing these contributions will be based on technical aspects and benefits to the practice of communities working in the above fields in general and RoboCup in particular. IMPORTANT DATES Submission of full papers: 8 April 2024 (changed from January 30 to better align with previous years) Notification to authors: 22 May 2024 RoboCup Symposium 2024: 22 July 2024 (RoboCup on 15-21 July 2024) SUBMISSION AND PROCEEDINGS All papers will be peer-reviewed and evaluated by members of the senior program committee. The proceedings of the RoboCup International Symposium will be published and archived within the Lecture Notes in Artificial Intelligence (LNCS/LNAI) series by Springer-Verlag after the conference. Papers should be formatted following the LNAI author guidelines (https://www.springer.com/gp/computer-science/lncs/conference-proceedings-gu…) and must be electronically submitted through Springer's electronic-submission system EquinOCS (https://equinocs.springernature.com/service/RoboCup2024). Submissions are limited to 12 pages including references. The LNAI author guidelines site contains a Springer's proceedings LaTeX template (v2.23), an older version of this template (v2.21) is also available in Overleaf: (https://www.overleaf.com/latex/templates/springer-conference-proceedings-te…) TOPICS Topics of interest include, but are not limited to: * Robot Hardware and Software - mobile robotics - humanoid robotics - sensors and actuators - embedded and mobile devices - robot construction and new materials - robot system integration - robot software architectures - robot programming environments and languages - real-time and concurrent programming - robot simulators - sim2real learning * Perception and Action - 3D perception - distributed sensor integration - sensor noise filtering - real-time image processing and pattern recognition - motion and sensor models - sensory-motor control - robot kinematics and dynamics - high-dimensional motion control * Robot Cognition and Learning - world modelling and knowledge representation - learning from demonstration and imitation - localisation, navigation, and mapping - planning and reasoning - decision making under uncertainty - neural systems and deep learning - complex motor skill acquisition - reinforcement learning and optimisation - motion and sensor model learning * Human-Robot Interaction - robot social intelligence - fluency of interaction - speech synthesis and natural language generation - natural language recognition - explainable robot behaviours - emotion recognition and reaction - understanding human intent and behaviour - safety, security and dependability - enabling humans to predict robot behaviour * Multi-Robot Systems - team coordination methods - communication protocols - learning and adaptive systems - teamwork and heterogeneous agents - dynamic resource allocation - adjustable autonomy * Education and Edutainment - robotics and artificial intelligence education - educational robotics - robot kits and programming tools - robotic entertainment * Applications and Benchmarking - search and rescue robots - robot surveillance - service and social robots - robots at home, at work and in public spaces - robots in the real world - performance metrics - human-robot interaction DEVELOPMENT TRACK To encourage open-source release of hardware and software systems, the RoboCup International Symposium has included a development track in recent years. In 2024, we expand the scope of this track to include datasets and benchmarks. We encourage the submission of papers describing open-source hardware and software, tools and frameworks that facilitate development of robotics hardware and software, datasets that enable new robotic capabilities, as well as benchmarks that establish reproducible test beds and performance metrics to advance research. If applicable, contributions to the special track should include evidence of the released system or dataset, and highlight past, ongoing, and/or potential future impacts on the RoboCup community. A review of these contributions will be based on technical merit and benefits to the RoboCup community, and the research topics listed above. PROGRAM CO-CHAIRS Hiroyuki Okada (Tamagawa University, Japan) Elena Torta (Eindhoven University of Technology, NL) Josiah Hanna (University of Wisconsin, USA ) Edna Barros (Federal University of Pernambuco, Brazil) LOCAL ORGANIZERS Elena Torta (Eindhoven University of Technology, NL) Ömür Arslan (Eindhoven University of Technology, NL) Femke van Beek (Eindhoven University of Technology, NL) Arnoud Visser (University of Amsterdam, NL) CONTACT You can contact via the PC chairs via the contact button in EquinOCS

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[meetings] ROS2 Industrial Training 2024
by Yuhong Lin 18 Jan '24

18 Jan '24

Get ROS2 Industrial Ready: Hands-On Training (02/19-02/21, 2024) Dear Roboticists, Looking to quickly master ROS2 for your robot project? Don't miss this intensive online training where you'll grasp key concepts and practice with real robots remotely. You will learn how to: - Use ROS2 in real robots - Make robots navigate with Nav2 - Manipulate objects using ROS2 with a robotic arm *Training Details:* - *Dates*: February 19 - 21, 2024 - *Location*: Live Online Classes + Remote Real Robot Practice - *Time*: 9:00 – 18:00 Central European Time (CET) - *Limited Seats:* Only 15 participants - *Website*: https://www.theconstructsim.com/ros2-industrial-workshop/ <https://www.theconstructsim.com/ros2-industrial-workshop/?utm_source=robocu…> - *Early registration deadline:* February 1st, 2024 *About the Training:* Join industry mentors for a 3-Day Live Training: Master ROS2 for industrial. Learn crucial skills in ROS2 basics, navigation, and manipulation. *What You Will Learn:* - Basic ROS2 Concepts - RSO2 Topic Subscribers & Publishers - RViz2 debugging tool - ROS2 DDS - ROS2 Services - ROS2 Actions - ROS1_Bridge - Parameters in ROS - ROS2 Mapping - ROS2 Localization - ROS2 Path Planning - ROS2 Obstacle Avoidance - Nav2 Galactic Functionality - Nav2 Behavior Trees - Navigation Plugins and Custom Plugin Creation - Simple Commander API - Waypoint Follower - Controller Server in Deep - Configure a Moveit2 package for a robotic arm - Programatically perform motion planning - Use perception to detect an object’s location - Grasp objects *Practical Sessions @ Warehouse Robot Lab* Remote hands-on practice throughout the training at the Warehouse Robot Lab with real industrial robots. Learn more at https://www.theconstructsim.com/ros2-industrial-workshop/ <https://www.theconstructsim.com/ros2-industrial-workshop/?utm_source=robocu…> . This training is organized by TheConstruct.ai <https://www.theconstructsim.coma/>. For any questions please email us at info(a)theconstructsim.com. Best regards, The Construct AI team

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Call for Participation - IranOpen 2024 - Remote and Free
by Ashkan Keshavarzi 17 Jan '24

17 Jan '24

Call for Participation Soccer Simulation 2d league IranOpen2024 The 18th RoboCup IranOpen (IranOpen 2024) Competition will be held in Tehran, Iran on *April*. (http://iranopenrobocup.ir/) As a member of the technical committee, I would be honored to invite you to participate in Soccer Simulation 2D League (Remote and Free). Registration Conditions: 1. This competition will be held remotely. 2. Participation cost in this Competition is free for Non-domestic teams. 3. There is no qualification round for Non-domestic teams, so you can participate without sending a TDP. 4. Non-domestic teams should also send their information in the form of an email with the subject of IranOpen2024 to keshavarzi.ashkan(a)gmail.com before the deadline (*08 February*). 5. A participation certificate will be given to each team member. 6. It is possible for only one non-domestic team to be among the first three. (Imagine that 3 teams (A, B, C) participated as non-domestic teams, and the order is A, B, D, E, F, so the first team will be A, the second team will be D, and the third team will be E.) This information included : 1. Team Name: 2. Team Leader: 3. E-Mail: 4. Country: 5. Affiliation: 6. Team members: *Teams can upload a new binary before each round! Thank you for your consideration, and do not hesitate to contact us at this address if you have any further questions. We look forward to hearing back from you. Best regards, Ashkan Keshavarzi, Nader Zare

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Call for Papers: The 6th Games, Agents, and Incentives Workshop (GAIW)@AAMAS 2024
by Nicholas Mattei 17 Jan '24

17 Jan '24

TL;DR: Webpage: https://preflib.github.io/gaiw2024 - Submission Deadline: February 26, 2024 (AoE). - Acceptance Notification: March 28, 2024. - Camera Ready: April 15, 2024 (AoE). - Workshop: May 6 or 7, 2024 (TBA). Call for Papers: We invite submissions to the 6th iteration of the Games, Agents and Incentives Workshop, co-located with AAMAS 2024 in Auckland, New Zealand. Games, Agents and Incentives is a confederated workshop which focuses on agents and incentives in AI. In particular, it promotes approaches that deal with game theory (cooperative and non-cooperative), social choice, and agent-mediated e-commerce aspects of AI systems. The confederated workshop merges multiple workshops that have been associated with AAMAS in the past, which considered different aspects of the general interplay between AI and economics: • CoopMAS: Cooperative Games in Multi-agent Systems • AMEC: Agent-Mediated Electronic Commerce • EXPLORE: Exploring Beyond the Worst Case in Computational Social Choice Over the past two decades, the focus of agent incentives in decentralised and centralised AI systems has increased dramatically. These issues come up when designing preference aggregation mechanisms and markets; computing equilibria and bidding strategies; facilitating cooperation among agents; and fairly dividing resources. ********************************************************** PAPER SUBMISSION ********************************************************** Authors should submit full papers electronically in PDF format at https://cmt3.research.microsoft.com/GAIW2024 Formatting Guidelines: Please format papers according to the AAMAS 2024 format (author kit <https://www.aamas2024-conference.auckland.ac.nz/calls/submission-instructio…>). Optionally, one may submit in LNCS format as well (LaTeX template). Paper Length: Papers can be at most 8 pages long in AAMAS format, or 12 pages long in LNCS format. Additional pages may be used for references. Supplemental material can be appended at the end of the paper. However, reviewers are instructed to make their evaluations based on the main submission, and are not obligated to consult the supplemental material. Multiple Submissions: To widen participation and encourage discussion, there will be no formal publication of workshop proceedings. We will, however, post the accepted papers online to the benefit of the participants to the workshop. Therefore, submission of preliminary work and papers to be submitted or in preparation for submission to other major venues in the field are encouraged. Past Submissions: In order to strike a balance between new work and work that may have been presented, but not widely seen, we ask that if authors want to submit published work they do so non-anonymously and clearly indicate when and where the work was published. We will only accept work which has been published in the last calendar year (e.g., IJCAI 2023, NeurIPS 2023, AAAI 2023, AAAI 2024 and any conference held strictly after February 2023). We invite papers on topics of game theory, mechanism design, fair allocation, computational social choice, and their applications to multi-agent systems: - Algorithmic mechanism design - Auctions - Behavioral Game Theory - Bounded rationality - Cooperative Games - Computational advertising - Computational aspects of equilibria - Computational social choice - Coalitions, coordination, collective action, and cooperation - Economic aspects of security and privacy - Economic aspects of distributed and network computing - Equilibrium computation - Empirical approaches to e-market - Fairness (in ML & elsewhere) - Fair Division - Incentives in machine learning - Information and attention economics - Learning in games (e.g., solution concepts and equilibria) - Matching and Matching Markets - Negotiation - Price differentiation and price dynamics - Social networks - Trading agent design and analysis - Uncertainty in AI and economics Best Presentation Award: The organizing committee of GAIW will be giving two awards (first-place and runner up) for best paper presentations. The award criteria include the clarity of presentation, the level of engagement, the content, and discussion handline. Inquiries: If you have any questions, direct them to alan.tsang(a)carleton.ca. ********************************************************** IMPORTANT DATES ********************************************************** - Submission Deadline: February 26, 2024 (AoE). - Acceptance Notification: March 28, 2024. - Camera Ready: April 15, 2024 (AoE). - Workshop: May 6 or 7, 2024 (TBA). ********************************************************** ORGANIZATION ********************************************************** Program Chairs Ben Abramowitz, Tulane University Haris Aziz, UNSW Sydney and Data61 John P. Dickerson, University of Maryland Hadi Hosseini, Penn State University Nicholas Mattei, Tulane University Svetlana Obraztsova, Carleton University Zinovi Rabinovich, Carleton University Alan Tsang, Carleton University Tomasz Wąs, Penn State University -- *Nicholas Mattei* Assistant Professor, Tulane University nsmattei(a)tulane.edu | www.nickmattei.net Stanley Thomas Hall | 305B +1 504 865 5782 Department of Computer Science Tulane University 6823 St Charles Ave New Orleans, LA 70118

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RoboCup 2024 Soccer Simulation 2D League - Call for Participation (Second Call)
by MROA 16 Jan '24

16 Jan '24

Call for Participation RoboCup 2024 Soccer Simulation 2D League July 15 – July 21, 2024 Eindhoven, Netherlands https://2024.robocup.org/ <https://2023.robocup.org/> ===================================== Greetings RoboCuppers, We invite you to participate in the RoboCup 2024 Soccer Simulation League 2D competition, which will take place *July 15 – July 21, 2024*, in *Eindhoven, Netherlands*. The RoboCup Soccer Simulation 2D League is one of the oldest RoboCup Soccer competitions. It is based on the RoboCup Soccer Simulator that enables two teams of 11 simulated autonomous robots plus an autonomous coach agent to play a soccer game with very realistic rules and gameplay. The RoboCup Soccer Simulator is an outstanding research and educational tool for multiagent systems, artificial intelligence, and machine learning due to its stability. ===================================== To view the full Call for Participation document, please visit: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1O02gc-9HZ3x95NnirHg45S3Z0uiZVIKwIKfXi1G… ===================================== If you are interested in participating, please pre-register your team and submit the required qualification materials. Pre-registration and Qualification Deadline: *February 17th – 23:59 UTC* - Submit information via *the online form* - It is recommended that you pre-register as soon as possible to ensure that you receive the latest update. - Submit* Information, TDP and Log Files *via the online form - https://forms.gle/hGe1gtnqpXrBtD8G8 Qualification Notification: *Feb 29th – 23:59 UTC* ===================================== If you have any questions or concerns, please email us at the address provided in the documentation. Best Regards, Omid Amini, Nader Zare RoboCup2024 Soccer Simulation 2D League Organizing Committee

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[meetings][CFP][Special Session] RO-MAN 2024 - Call for Proposals of Special Session and Papers of Special at the 33rd IEEE International Conference on Robot and Human Interactive Communication
by Alessandra Rossi 14 Jan '24

14 Jan '24

Call for Proposals of Special Session and Papers of Special Sessions Dear colleagues, We are very pleased to invite you to submit your proposals for Special Sessions at the 33rd IEEE International Conference on Robot and Human Interactive Communication, which will take place at the Pasadena Convention Center in Pasadena, California, USA, from August 26th to 30th, 2024. The theme of the IEEE RO-MAN 2024 is “Embracing Human-Centered HRI”. The annual conference serves as a platform for researchers to showcase cutting-edge innovations and present state-of-the-art findings across a diverse spectrum of topics related to Robot and Human Interactive Communication. Please visit the office website www.ro-man2024.org for more information. The format of RO-MAN 2024 will be either "hybrid" or in-person only. The committee will make a decision in early 2024. ***Important Dates*** Proposal Submission Deadline: January 19, 2024 Notification of Proposal Acceptance: February 2, 2024 Special Session Paper Submission Deadline: March 10, 2024 Notification of Paper Acceptance: May 10, 2024 Camera-ready Paper Deadline: June 7, 2024 The goal of the special sessions is to provide a forum for focused oral presentations highlighting emerging topics or innovative applications of established approaches. A typical special session consists of four to six papers, which, for example, addresses a particular theme or consists of collaborative work done in an international project or network. It is expected for each special session to be run for 80 minutes ~ 2 hours approximately. TEMPLATES AND SUBMISSION PROCEDURE Prospective special session organisers are invited to submit a proposal via the main conference's submission system <https://ras.papercept.net/conferences/scripts/start.pl>. The organisers of the accepted special sessions will be responsible for the high-quality peer-review of the submitted papers according to IEEE standards (i.e. at least 2 anonymous peer-reviews). The organisers will be Associate Editors (AE) for the proposed session, and they will be responsible for assigning reviewers and evaluating the submitted paper for their special session. All submitted special session papers will be subject to the same peer-review process as for regular papers and will be included in the main conference proceedings (IEEE Xplore Digital Library). Proposals should include the following information: - Title: Please propose a title that shows the relevance of the session for the RO-MAN community and the innovativeness of the proposed topic. - Aims and scope of the Special Session: Please explain why the chosen topic is novel, relevant and can potentially contribute to the RO-MAN community, and how it’s well suited within the conference theme or other new emerging themes with a potential impact. - Organisers and biographies: Please provide a short bio-sketch for each session organiser including name, title, affiliation, country, email, phone, their experience related to the topic of the Special Session. - Tentative speakers: Please provide a list of prospective contributing authors and tentative titles. Special Sessions are normally expected to have 4 to 6 papers. Invited speakers or session-related demonstrations (such as renowned speakers or industrial talks) could be a part of the Special Session. Proposals should not exceed a maximum of 5 pages. Templates are availables for LaTeX <https://ras.papercept.net/conferences/support/tex.php> and MS Word <https://ras.papercept.net/conferences/support/word.php>. The primary criteria in the evaluation of special session proposals will be the timeliness of the topics, the quality, track record, and diversity of the proposers and speakers, the coherence of the proposal, the novelty or creativity, and the expected value added to the overall conference. Aspects of diversity that will be considered include the age, gender, national origin, background, and workplace of the proposers and speakers. We will give priority to proposals that fully follow these requirements. Moreover, we encourage the submission of special sessions organized by communities that are under-represented within the RO-MAN activities. For any questions and further information about the Special Session proposal, please email submission(a)ro-man2024.org IEEE RO-MAN 2024 Organizing Committee ***Special Session Chairs*** Alessandra Rossi and Lantao Liu

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Call for Participation: RoboCup2024 Middle Size League
by liufei＠caa.org.cn 04 Jan '24

04 Jan '24

The content of this message was lost. It was probably cross-posted to multiple lists and previously handled on another list.

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Travel Support Deadline Extended: The 2024 IEEE-RAS Response Robotics Seasonal School and Workshop
by Raymond Sheh 04 Jan '24

04 Jan '24

Hi All! We have extended the deadline for student travel support applications for the Response Robotics Seasonal School and Workshop, to be held in Burnet, Texas, March 4-7, and co-located with the Texas Public Safety Robotics Summit. The new deadline for travel support applications is January 12th although we encourage students to apply early. We particularly encourage current and prospective RoboCupRescue Robot League team members, and RoboCupRescue Rapidly Manufactured Robot Challenge mentors, to join us as we will be having a league roadmap discussion during the event. The summary of the event is pasted below, see the website at https://responserobotics.org for the full details and instructions on how to register and apply for travel support. Please do forward this on to any interested students and researchers! You can contact us, either via the mailing list or Discord server on the website, or via email to info(a)responserobotics.org if you have any questions. (If you previously tried to email us and it bounced, please try again, we recently fixed a server issue.) Cheers! - Raymond Sheh -- Dr. Raymond Sheh Uncrewed Aircraft Systems Research Lead and Guest Researcher UAS Portfolio, Public Safety Communications Research Division Communications Technology Laboratory National Institute of Standards and Technology U.S. Department of Commerce 100 Bureau Drive, Stop 8230, Gaithersburg MD 20899-8230, USA Adjunct Associate Research Scientist Whiting School of Engineering Johns Hopkins University Columbia MD, USA Trustee, RoboCup Federation ======== Call for Participation ======== The 2024 IEEE-RAS Response Robotics Seasonal School and Workshop March 4-7, 2024 Reveille Proving Grounds, Burnet, TX, USA and Online Co-located with the 2024 Texas Public Safety Robotics Summit https://responserobotics.org | info(a)responserobotics.org === Introduction: === The 2024 IEEE-RAS Response Robotics Seasonal School and Workshop (RRSS+W) is a 4-day-long immersive academic research event for undergraduate and graduate research students, mentors of high school research robotics teams, and early career researchers, on the challenges and best-in-class solutions for applied response robotics. It is financially sponsored by the IEEE-RAS and student travel support scholarships are available for IEEE-RAS students. It is co-located with the 2024 Texas Public Safety Robotics Summit (TXPS, https://www.txpsrobots.com/ ), a high profile industry event for responders, manufacturers, and government agencies. Attendees of the RRSS+W will have a unique opportunity to engage with and learn from the end users about how their technologies might be used, manufacturers on the challenges of transitioning technologies from the lab into the real world, and various regulatory bodies on the risk management and legal landscape within which these technologies must operate. === Format: === In-person and online participants in the RRSS+W will have the opportunity to participate in lectures and panel discussions on topics ranging from theoretical techniques to real world applications, with a focus on presentations from outside of academia. In addition, in-person participants will have the opportunity to participate in: - Hands-on practical sessions that give attendees an in-depth opportunity learn about a specific topic. - Demonstration and test sessions that allow attendees to deploy their own robots within the test methods and scenarios, and observe other robots being tested. - A workshop poster session that allows attendees to present their work to other attendees as well as the attendees of the TXPS, including those who may have an interest in adopting these technologies. - Social events that promote networking between RRSS+W attendees as well as the rest of the response robotics ecosystem. === Topics: === This year will highlight three topics that have been identified as being of particular up-and-coming interest in the response robotics space. We are particularly soliciting the involvement of students who are interested in these topics. - Novel communication technologies for challenging response environments. - Integration of Uncrewed Aircraft Systems (aka UAS, RPAS, or aerial drones) into response robotics applications. - Cybersecurity and Artificial Intelligence (AI) Risk Management Challenges for the Response Robotics ecosystem. We are also encouraging students who are interested in broader response robotics topics to attend, including, but not limited to: - 3D mapping and indoor/outdoor navigation in unstructured environments. - Mobility in challenging terrain and among 3D obstacles. - Dexterous manipulation and inspection. - Transition of technologies into real world unstructured environments. - Novel sensors for response robotics. The RRSS+W will also host a roadmap discussion for the RoboCupRescue Robot League, with a focus on engaging with the end user community. We invite past, present, and prospective competitors to join us! === Venue: === The venue hosts both real world scenarios, complete with the uncertainty, weather, and communications challenges that it brings, as well as standard test methods that provide repeatable, reproducible, evaluations of robot capabilities that attendees can replicate in their own labs. Attendees will have a unique opportunity to observe robots of their interest performing in both the scenarios and the test methods, as well as bring their own robots to test and refine over the course of the event. Please check the website and join the mailing list for updates regarding accommodation and transportation arrangements. === Registration and Timelines: === The registration fee for in-person attendance is $300 and includes registration for the broader TXPS. As space is limited, registration is capped and competitive, based on a cover letter - see the website for details. Registration will be decided on a rolling basis and closes February 1st, 2024, or when the event reaches capacity so we advise prospective attendees to register early. IEEE-RAS students may use the same letter to apply for a limited number of competitive travel support scholarships that include the fee and a partial travel reimbursement - see the website for details. Travel support applications will be decided on a rolling basis and closes January 12th, 2024, or when all funds have been allocated, so please apply early. Please see https://responserobotics.org for instructions on how to register and apply for travel support. Remote attendance of the lectures will be free of charge, dependent on connectivity. Join the mailing list or keep an eye on the website for details. === Contact: === See https://responserobotics.org for further details, and to join our mailing list and Discord server. Email info(a)responserobotics.org for any questions.

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[meetings] [news] Online Submission Open: 3rd Benchmark for Autonomous Robot Navigation (BARN) Challenge -- ICRA 2024 Competition
by Xuesu Xiao 22 Dec '23

22 Dec '23

Submission Form: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSfZLMVluXE-HWnV9lNP00LuBi3e9HFOeLi… Competition Website: https://cs.gmu.edu/~xiao/Research/BARN_Challenge/BARN_Challenge24.html Participation Instructions: https://github.com/Daffan/nav-competition-icra2022 Lessons Learned from The BARN Challenge 2023: https://cs.gmu.edu/~xiao/papers/barn23_report.pdf Lessons Learned from The BARN Challenge 2022: https://cs.gmu.edu/~xiao/papers/barn22_report.pdf Dear roboticists, are you interested in agile robot navigation in highly constrained spaces with a lot of obstacles around, e.g., cluttered households or after-disaster scenarios? Do you think mobile robot navigation is mostly a solved problem? Are you looking for a hands-on project for your robotics class, but may not have (sufficient) robot platforms for your students? If your answer is yes to any of the above questions, we sincerely invite you to participate in our (3rd) ICRA 2024 BARN Challenge (https://cs.gmu.edu/~xiao/Research/BARN_Challenge/BARN_Challenge24.html)! The BARN Challenge aims at evaluating state-of-the-art autonomous navigation systems to move robots through highly constrained environments in a safe and efficient manner. The task is to navigate a standardized Clearpath Jackal robot from a predefined start to a goal location as quickly as possible without any collision. The challenge will take place both in the simulated BARN dataset and in physical obstacle courses at ICRA2024. 1. The competition task is designing ground navigation systems to navigate through all 300 BARN environments (https://cs.gmu.edu/~xiao/Research/BARN/BARN.html) and physical obstacle courses constructed at ICRA2024 as fast as possible without collision. 2. The 300 BARN environments can be the training set for learning-based methods, or to design classical approaches in. During the simulation competition, we will generate another 50 unseen environments unavailable to the participants before the competition. 3. We will standardize a Jackal robot in the Gazebo simulation, including a Hokuyo 2D LiDAR, motor controller of 2m/s max speed, etc. 4. Participants can use any approaches to tackle the navigation problem, such as using classical sampling-based or optimization-based planners, end-to-end learning, or hybrid approaches. We will provide baselines for reference. 5. A standardized scoring system is provided on the website. 6. We will invite the top teams in simulation to compete in the real world. The team who achieves the fastest collision-free navigation in the physical obstacle courses wins. If you are interested in participating, please submit your navigation system at https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSfZLMVluXE-HWnV9lNP00LuBi3e9HFOeLi… Co-Organizers: Xuesu Xiao (George Mason University) Zifan Xu (UT Austin) Garrett Warnell (US Army Research Lab / UT Austin) Peter Stone (UT Austin / Sony AI) Sponsor: Clearpath Robotics, https://clearpathrobotics.com/ Thanks Xuesu ----------------------- Xuesu Xiao, Ph.D. -- Assistant Professor Department of Computer Science George Mason University xiao(a)gmu.edu https://cs.gmu.edu/~xiao/

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RoboCup 2024 Small Size League Call for Participation
by Carla Cosenza 20 Dec '23

20 Dec '23

Hello! The Small Size League committee is glad to invite you to participate in the RoboCup 2024! Below you can find important information about the competition and qualification. Location and dates RoboCup Eindhoven 2024 Small Size League July 17-21, 2024 https://2024.robocup.org/ About RoboCup RoboCup is an international scientific initiative with the goal to advance the state of the art of intelligent robots. When established in 1997, the original mission was to field a team of robots capable of winning against the human soccer World Cup champions by 2050. About the Small Size League The RoboCup Small Size League is a part of the RoboCup Research Federation focused on multi-agent coordination and control. Teams currently compete in 11 vs. 11 soccer matches (6 vs. 6 in Div. B). The robots must fit within an 18 cm diameter circle and must be no higher than 15 cm. The robots play soccer with an orange golf ball on a green carpeted field that is about 12 m long by 9 m wide. About the qualification To qualify for the competition, each team must submit a Team Description Paper and a video by February 13, 2024. More information on the qualification requirements and processes are located on the website. Please direct all inquiries to the Small Size League Organizing Committee: rc-ssl-oc(a)lists.robocup.org Thank you! Carla Cosenza RoboCup Small Size League | Organizing Committee

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Postdoc Position in RL/imitation learning for robot navigation in simulated environments (University of Edinburgh, UK)
by Stefano V. Albrecht 20 Dec '23

20 Dec '23

Postdoctoral Research Fellowship Position “Reinforcement learning and imitation learning for robot navigation in simulated environments” About the position We are seeking a motivated candidate to fill a postdoctoral research fellow position in “Reinforcement learning and imitation learning for robot navigation in simulated environments”. This position will be hosted and located in the Autonomous Agents Research Group (https://agents.inf.ed.ac.uk) in the School of Informatics, University of Edinburgh, United Kingdom. The researcher will be supervised jointly by Prof. Stefano V. Albrecht (University of Edinburgh) and Prof. Concetto Spampinato (University of Catania). What will you be doing Contribute to the project through research activities, including: • Conduct a comprehensive literature review to understand the current state-of-the-art in reinforcement learning, imitation learning, and robot navigation. • Develop novel reinforcement learning and imitation learning algorithms tailored to the specific challenges of robot navigation in our simulated environment MIDGARD (https://midgardsim.org/). • Design, together with engineers, more realistic and diverse simulated environments that capture the complexities of real-world scenarios in MIDGARD. • Develop evaluation metrics and protocols to assess the performance of reinforcement learning and imitation learning algorithms in these environments. • Define and validate methods for sim-to-real challenges that may arise in the transition from simulation to physical robots. This activity will be carried out jointly with robotics researchers. Candidate requirements PhD in AI, machine learning, computer science, or related area. Excellent publication track record in leading conferences for AI/ML/robotics research. Background and expertise in one or more of the following areas: • RL and imitation learning algorithms • Knowledge of robotic systems and challenges in navigation • Solid foundation in machine and deep learning concepts and techniques • Proficient in Python and Pytorch algorithm development Employment package 12 months initially, with option to extend to 36 months subject to performance review. Standard salary for research postdoc in Italy (1.500 Euros/month). Accommodation costs (i.e. rent) are additionally covered. Paid trips to conferences to present work. Desktop/laptop computer. How to apply Interested candidates are encouraged to contact the PeRCeiVe Lab research admin at alessia.spitaleri(a)unict.it<mailto:alessia.spitaleri@unict.it> for further details on how to apply and support with the application process. For questions about the position and research, please contact Prof. Stefano Albrecht (s.albrecht(a)ed.ac.uk<mailto:s.albrecht@ed.ac.uk>) and Prof. Concetto Spampinato (concetto.spampinato(a)unict.it<mailto:concetto.spampinato@unict.it>). Applications close: December 27th 2023 at noon (Italian time) -- Dr. Stefano V. Albrecht Associate Professor, School of Informatics, University of Edinburgh Head of Autonomous Agents Research Group (https://agents.inf.ed.ac.uk) Royal Society Industry Fellow, Five AI/Bosch (www.five.ai<http://www.five.ai>) Royal Academy of Engineering Industrial Fellow, Dematic/KION (www.dematic.com<http://www.dematic.com>) The University of Edinburgh is a charitable body, registered in Scotland, with registration number SC005336. Is e buidheann carthannais a th’ ann an Oilthigh Dhùn Èideann, clàraichte an Alba, àireamh clàraidh SC005336.

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Call for Participation RoboCup 2024 Humanoid Soccer Competition - Eindhoven, July 2024
by Reinaldo A. C. Bianchi 19 Dec '23

19 Dec '23

* Call for Participation * RoboCup 2024 Humanoid Soccer Competition https://humanoid.robocup.org/ July 17 - 21, 2024, Eindhoven, the Netherlands =========================================================== The RoboCup Humanoid League invites teams to apply for participation at the RoboCup 2024 Humanoid Soccer Competition in Eindhoven, the Netherlands. The Humanoid League will host competitions in the following categories: * KidSize: 40 - 100cm robot height (FIFA size 1 ball) * AdultSize: 100 - 200cm robot height (FIFA size 5 ball) For more detailed class definitions, please refer to the humanoid league home page at https://humanoid.robocup.org/. Teams do not need to provide a full robot team to apply for competing in the Humanoid Soccer Competition. The qualifying round of Drop-In games will be played with only one robot per team. Teams that cannot provide a full team of robots (four robots in KidSize and two in AdultSize) will be grouped to form a playable team for the main tournament games. Teams are also encouraged to form and apply as joint teams. Joint proposals will be judged on their combined merit. In case of a sufficient number of qualified teams, the sub-leagues (KidSize and/or AdultSize) will be divided into League A and League B. Teams are seeded into the leagues based on the results of an initial round of Drop-In games. For the qualification process, teams must provide the following material: 1) Robot Video --------------------------------------- Teams need to provide a video of their robot demonstrating the robots' autonomous soccer playing skills. The recommended skills needed for qualification are: * localization of unknown ball position, * walking ability towards the ball, * robot positioning at the ball for kicking, * kicking the ball towards the goal, * ability of getting up autonomously from a fall (KidSize only) We encourage teams to include in the video more complex and intelligent behavior such as demonstrating localization, and robots playing in a game, recordings from actual soccer matches are admissible. If possible, please provide footage that demonstrates the robot behavior without wires attached. The qualification video must be supplied as a link via YouTube. The maximum duration of the video must not exceed 5 minutes. The qualifying team is responsible to ensure that the video adheres to YouTube's TOS (especially in regard to music copyright) to prevent the video from being blocked for the reviewers. Teams that do not provide a qualification video or a viewable video will not be qualified! 2) Software Description --------------------------------------- During the registration process, a form will be provided to submit details about the algorithms used or anticipated to be used for the participation in the 2024 competition. Algorithms shall be described in such detail that they can be reproduced by other teams. If software from other teams or standard algorithms are used, references need to be included. If the algorithm has been adapted to be used in the competition, those deviations need to be described in appropriate details. The form will include questions in the following areas: * Walking * Vision * Localization * Team Communication * Behavior * Contributions to the RoboCup community, e.g. software releases, paper publications, provision of league infrastructure or data sets Responses to the questions are expected to reflect the current or anticipated status of the software during the RoboCup 2024 competition. If the software has not changed or no changes are anticipated to be made until the competition, teams may copy & paste a response from previously submitted material. 3) Extended Abstract --------------------------------------- A two-page extended abstract must be submitted. For teams which have previously participated in the Humanoid League, the extended abstract needs to: * include lessons learned from the participation in previous RoboCup competitions * highlight major problems that the team is trying to solve for the upcoming competition * outline the plans for the major changes that the teams anticipate to have implemented by the RoboCup 2024 competition * describe the implementation status of the changes planned by the time of submitting the application For teams which have never participated in the RoboCup Humanoid League, the Extended Abstract needs to pitch the scientific aspects of their humanoid robotic system and highlight their research interests. The Extended Abstract is limited to 2 pages maximum and must be submitted in PDF format. Extended Abstracts are designed to highlight the changes and scientific developments since the last RoboCup. Thus, we expect the usage of material from previous TDPs or Extended Abstracts to be minimal. If used, they need to be cited appropriately. Submissions of last year's Extended Abstract will be desk-rejected. The Extended Abstract must follow the LNCS format which can be downloaded from https://www.springer.com/gp/computer-science/lncs/conference-proceedings-gu…. Teams that do to follow the LNCS formatting and style guidelines will not be qualified. No exceptions to this rule will be made. 4) Robot Specification --------------------------------------- Regardless of the kid or adult size competition, a one-page specification (PDF) must be provided for each different type of humanoid robot used by the team that includes the following: * Robot picture * Robot name * Height of the robot * Weight of the robot * Walking speed in cm/s * Number of degrees of freedom and type of motors on each kinematic chain of the robot * Type of sensors used (incl. type of camera(s) and specific manufacturer part number (e.g. “6-DoF IMU” is NOT an acceptable description)) * Computing unit(s) * Materials (e.g. Torso aluminum, legs and arms CFRP) * Electronics (e.g. CM730 for communicating with servos) * Battery (e.g. 3S1P 2200mAh LiPo) * Open Source link if applicable * Other specs 5) Letter of Commitment --------------------------------------- A one-page letter addressed to the RoboCup Humanoid League Technical Committee including the following: * a statement committing to participate in the RoboCup 2024 Humanoid League competition, * a statement committing to make a person with sufficient knowledge of the rules available as referee during the competition. The letter must be printed, hand signed by the team leader, digitally scanned and submitted either as a JPG, PNG or PDF file. If the letter does not contain a hand-written signature, it is not considered valid. The TC may include the fulfillment of the statement of commitment of participation as well as the performance of the team's referee in previous RoboCup competitions into consideration for qualification. Each application to the Humanoid Soccer Competition will be reviewed by two members of the Technical Committee and two other teams applying to the Humanoid Soccer Competition. The combined reviewing score will decide whether a team qualifies for participation. Reviewing other team's material is mandatory for teams that want to participate in the Humanoid Soccer Competition. Failing to provide an adequate review by the provided deadline will have consequences for the team’s own qualification status. 6) Rules --------------------------------------- The current version of the rules may be found here at the Humanoid League website: https://humanoid.robocup.org/materials/rules/. We expect the final version of the 2024 rules to be published in early spring 2024. 7) Registration --------------------------------------- The following information is required for registration: * Team name * URL of the team's home page * Name of team leader or team contact person * E-mail address of team leader or contact person * Postal address of the team, team leader or contact person * Competition category: Humanoid Soccer Competition KidSize or AdultSize Please note that teams applying for participation in several categories must submit individual application material for each class, and pay the appropriate registration fee for each category. At least one team member must register on each team. Furthermore, teams in different categories must be able to compete, and guarantee to have members acting as referees available independently and at the same time. 8) Plagiarism --------------------------------------- Plagiarism, loosely the unattributed use of other peoples' words, code, and ideas is not tolerated in the RoboCup community. See the point "Publishing Ethics" at https://www.springer.com/gp/computer-science/lncs/conference-proceedings-gu… for a more detailed description. The teams and team members that plagiarize another peoples' work and present it as their own will be disqualified. For a first offense, the team and team members will be banned from RoboCup competition for two years (usually the current and next year). Harsher penalties will be applied to repeat offenders or extremely serious cases of plagiarism. A team may be disqualified at any time for plagiarism, even after the competition has started. RoboCup will not reimburse teams for any expenses related to their disqualification. 9) Online Submission --------------------------------------- All qualification material must be submitted online at https://submission.robocuphumanoid.com 10) Important Dates --------------------------------------- Humanoid Soccer Competition * Submission system open: November 27th, 2023 * Submission deadline: December 15th, 2023 * Team Review Period: December 15th - December 22nd 2023 * Announcement of qualified teams: January 19th, 2024 11) Publication --------------------------------------- Please note that after the announcement of the qualified teams the qualified teams submitted material will be made publicly available on the Humanoid League website. Teams applying for participation, therefore, implicitly grant the right of publication of their qualification material to the Humanoid League. 12) Visa Process --------------------------------------- If you are a citizen of a country that needs a Visa for traveling to the Netherlands, please start the VISA process as soon as you receive your notification of qualification. If you are not sure if you're eligible for a VISA-exempt, please consult the official website of the Netherlands government for information, at https://www.government.nl/topics/holidays-and-travels/check-visa-netherlands. For more information about the humanoid league, please refer to the humanoid league home page at https://humanoid.robocup.org/ and join the humanoid league mailing list at: https://lists.robocup.org/listinfo/robocup-humanoid With best regards, Technical Committee of RoboCup Humanoid League 2023/2024 Esta mensagem, juntamente com qualquer outra informação anexada, é confidencial e protegida por lei. Somente os seus destinatários estão autorizados a usá-la. Se você não for o destinatário, por favor, informe o remetente e, em seguida, apague a mensagem, observando que não há autorização para usar, copiar, armazenar, encaminhar, imprimir ou tomar qualquer ação baseada no seu conteúdo.

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[news][meetings] Get ROS2 Industrial Ready Training 2024
by Yuhong Lin 18 Dec '23

18 Dec '23

Call for Participation: Get ROS2 Industrial Ready: Hands-On Training (02/19-02/21, 2024) Dear Roboticists, The 'Get ROS2 Industrial Ready’ training in 2024 will take place from February 19th to 21st. It includes both theory and hands-on sessions covering: - ROS2 Basics - ROS2 Navigation Stack (Nav2) - ROS2 Industrial Manipulation (using MoveIt 2) This training is designed for: - ROS or ROS2 beginners - Engineers aiming to quickly master ROS2 for real robot applications - Team leads seeking software solutions to develop scalable robotics products more efficiently. *Training Details:* - *Dates*: February 19 - 21, 2024 - *Location*: Live Online Classes + Remote Real Robot Practice - *Time*: 9:00 – 18:00 Central European Time (CET) - *Limited Seats:* Only 15 participants - *Website*: https://www.theconstructsim.com/ros2-industrial-workshop/ <https://www.theconstructsim.com/ros2-industrial-workshop/?utm_source=robocu…> *What You Will Learn:* - How to use ROS2 in real robots - How to make robots navigate with ROS2 - How to make a robotic arm manipulate objects using ROS2 *Training Highlights:* - Expert instruction from industry professionals - Hands-on experience with real robots - Interactive exercises with simulated robots *Practical Sessions @ Warehouse Robot Lab* Remote hands-on practice throughout the training at the Warehouse Robot Lab with real industrial robots. Learn more at https://www.theconstructsim.com/ros2-industrial-workshop/ <https://www.theconstructsim.com/ros2-industrial-workshop/?utm_source=robocu…> . This training is organized by TheConstruct.ai <https://www.theconstructsim.coma/>. For any questions please email us at info(a)theconstructsim.com. Best regards, The Construct team

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RoboCup SPL Call for Applications for Participation 2024
by Stefan Seering 15 Dec '23

15 Dec '23

Call for Applications for Participation RoboCup 2024 Standard Platform League spl.robocup.org <https://spl.robocup.org/> Monday 15th July through Monday 22th July 2024 Eindhoven, The Netherlands 2024.robocup.org <https://2024.robocup.org> RoboCup <https://www.robocup.org/> is an international initiative that fosters research and education in Robotics and Artificial Intelligence through a variety of competitions (RoboCupSoccer, RoboCupRescue, RoboCup@Home, RoboCupIndustrial, RoboCupJunior) involving mostly multi-robot systems. RoboCupSoccer currently includes a number of different robot soccer leagues that focus on different research challenges. *The Standard Platform League (SPL)* is characterized by all the teams using an identical robot platform. Participating researchers focus on algorithmic development for fully autonomous robots in the main competition and operation of robots with shared autonomy in technical challenges. The SPL robot soccer team competition games at RoboCup 2024 will be played between teams of fully autonomous NAO robots. Participating teams may use V6, V5 or older versions of the NAO humanoid robot manufactured by Aldebaran <https://www.aldebaran.com/en/nao>. Teams should be able to play on a randomly assigned field within one hour. The RoboCup 2024 SPL will host: * A soccer team competition as the main competition of the event. * A shared autonomy technical challenge. The soccer team competition will consist of a number of games that is similar to recent years for most teams. The draft rule book for 2024 will be released by 15th of December 2023 on the downloads page <https://spl.robocup.org/downloads/#2024>. The league operates two divisions: Champions Cup (CC) and Challenge Shield (CS). Teams in the Champions Cup division will compete in matches with up to 7 robots per team. Teams in the Challenge Shield division will compete in matches with up to 5 robots per team. The teams participating in the team competition should also compete in the additional technical challenge. The Technical challenge for 2024 is the shared autonomy challenge. This technical challenge requires participants to develop a mixed team that consists of one human-operated Nao robot and one fully autonomous Nao with the objective of exploring how humans and robots can cooperate in soccer. Teams are encouraged to improve their skills in these challenges so that aspects of these challenges can be included in the main competition in future years. More details regarding technical challenges will be given in the rule book <https://spl.robocup.org/downloads/#2024>. Joining the League The league is always ready to welcome new teams. If you are considering joining: the league has prepared information for you <https://spl.robocup.org/joining-robocup-spl/> to support you in your first steps. We encourage you to contact the organizing committees and other teams if you have questions. To assist in adoption of NAO V6 robots, source code examples and documentation regarding V6 robots were published on the SPL website <https://spl.robocup.org/v6-support/>. One can also find example code for V6 robots in the code released by participating teams. If you need access to the RoboCup NAOqi Image and the specific documentation, please write an email (mentioning your team affiliation and plans) to rc-spl-tc(a)lists.robocup.org. Qualification All interested teams that are not pre-qualified must apply by sending an email to the Technical Committee (see below). A valid application must contain: 1. *Team Description Paper:* See below. The TDP must be *attached as PDF file* to the email. 2. *Preference to compete in the Champions Cup or Challenge Shield:* State whether you prefer to compete in CC or CS. If you prefer to compete in CS, please state if you would accept an assignment to CC to balance the competition. 3. *Video presentation:* Include a link to a video (maximum 5 minutes long, uploaded on the team’s web site or on some video server) that demonstrates the status of the team. The organizing committees use the video to determine the readiness of the team to compete effectively, and hence should focus on the team’s ability to play soccer. Teams who did not participate in the team competition at RoboCup 2023 *must* include footage of at least one robot attempting to kick off and score (this footage must be captured as a single wide shot with no cuts). If robots from multiple teams are active in the footage (e.g., game footage), please include a textual overlay or additional document denoting which robots belong to the applying team for every scene. Videos of simulation contributions will also be accepted, but only when a real robot is unavailable. Preference will be given to teams that use real robots to show soccer skills in their video. 4. *Robot purchase plans:* State how many NAO robots your team plans to buy this year. Pre-Qualification Teams that reached the quarter-finals or finished in the top 5 of the technical challenges at RoboCup 2023 will be pre-qualified for RoboCup 2024, if they submit a valid application as detailed below. The following teams can make use of pre-qualification: * BadgerBots * Bembelbots * B-Human * Dutch Nao Team * HTWK Robots * HULKs * Nao Devils * NomadZ * RoboEireann * rUNSWift * R-ZWEI KICKERS * SPQR Team A valid application for pre-qualified teams must contain: 1. *Team Description Paper:* See below. The TDP must be *attached as PDF file* to the email. 2. *Preference to compete in the Champions Cup or Challenge Shield:* State whether you prefer to compete in CC or CS. If you prefer to compete in CS, please state if you would accept an assignment to CC to balance the competition. 3. *Robot purchase plans:* State how many NAO robots your team plans to buy this year. If a joint 2023 team splits, only one team can be pre-qualified for 2024 (please indicate which one). Team Description Paper Both regular and pre-qualified teams must submit a team description paper (TDP) attached as PDF file to their application email. For the TDP to be considered, it must: * be formatted according to the *Springer LNCS author guidelines <https://www.springer.com/gp/computer-science/lncs/conference-proceedings-gu…>*. * be no longer than *8 pages* (including references). * be structured in the following *sections with the specified headings*: 1. *Team Information:* o team name (the one true spelling, considering capitalization, spaces, hyphens, etc.) o team leader(s) o team contact email address o team website URL (if available) o country of origin o university/company affiliation(s) of the team 2. *Code Usage:* Acknowledge the team’s use of any other team’s code (1) previously from 2019 to present and (2) anticipated at RoboCup 2024. If code is used from other teams, is this code integrated into a code base that is mainly designed by the applying team? If the applying team does not use any other team’s code, state so. For further details, please have a look into the rule book, section A.1 <https://spl.robocup.org/downloads/#2024>. 3. *Own Contribution:* Describe in detail the ‘research publishable’ significant advancements the applying team has made and is going to use at RoboCup 2024, in accordance with the rule book, section A.1 <https://spl.robocup.org/downloads/#2024>. 4. *Past History:* provide game results in RoboCup Open competitions as well as main RoboCup competitions from 2020 onward. Include opponents and game scores from each competition in a table. State if the team plans to participate in any RoboCup Open competitions or friendlies prior to RoboCup 2024. 5. *Impact:* What is the impact of the team’s participation and research in RoboCup on (1) the SPL, (2) the team’s university/community? 6. *Other:* Present any other information that you believe supports your application. Please note that the TDP is not a peer-reviewed publication and will not appear in any collection apart from the RoboCup TDP archive <https://tdp.robocup.org>. Qualification for Regional Opens Only Teams may also submit a short intent to participate in a regional open if they do not wish to participate in the 2024 RoboCup competition. Although teams may participate in regional opens without submitting this intent to participate, teams who submit an intent to participate and become qualified may be eligible for future special robot pricing. Special robot pricing for teams competing in RoboCup Events are still being discussed. Updates about special prices will be announced as soon as offers and conditions are finalized. Teams must submit the following information by 15th of February 2024: (1) The team name, leader(s), and the university/company affiliation(s) of the team and (2) a short statement describing the status/progress of the team. A link to a short video showing robot soccer behaviours and/or game play (using robots or in simulation) may be included if available. Submission and Evaluation All applications with the (pre-)qualification material must be submitted by *15th of February 2024*, by email to rc-spl-tc(a)lists.robocup.org. Please use a subject matching the pattern *RoboCup 2024 Application <team name>*. Applications must not be sent to personal SPL TC/OC email addresses and must not contain video attachments. By submitting your application, you grant the SPL committees the rights to publish the TDP and application video / code release link. Note that applying serves as a statement of commitment to participate in the RoboCup 2024 SPL. If you have doubts regarding the ability of your team to participate (due to funding, visas, etc.), please apply by the deadline but note this in your application email. Declining to participate in any competition after the official early registration period has opened may negatively affect future applications (the later you decline, the worse it will affect future applications). Teams are encouraged to consider joint participation. Joint proposals will be judged on combined merit. Applications will be evaluated by criteria which include: 1. Potential to play competitive games at RoboCup 2024 (demonstrated ability to play soccer, previous results, etc.) 2. Contributions (and potential contributions) to league (code releases/papers, active in organization, developing own code, etc.) 3. Diversity (region, team make-up, unique characteristics, etc.) Since 2023 the competition rules require all teams to release the source code for novel contributions. This ensures that all teams can learn from good solutions and all teams are driven to make improvements each year. More details regarding code releases will be given in the rule book <https://spl.robocup.org/downloads/#2024>. All teams can expect to be required to publish a contribution. The form will be similar to the releases required of pre-qualified teams as stated in the 2023 rulebook. As part of the application phase teams will be assigned into the CC and CS divisions. Assignments will be judged based on previous performance and application material. The organizing committees will do their best to honor teams' preferences. However, the necessity might arise to assign teams into divisions against their preference. All teams applying for CC are expected to be able to compete in CS. Teams will be notified during the application phase if they are assigned into a division against their preference Qualification decisions, including alternate lists, will be announced by 1st of March 2024. Robot Acquisition Teams who submit an intent to participate and become qualified will be eligible for potential future special robot pricing. Special robot pricing for team competing in RoboCup Events are still being discussed. Updates about special prices will be announced if offers and conditions are finalized. /RoboCup 2024 Standard Platform League Technical and Organizing Committees/

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Postdoc Position in RL/imitation learning for robot navigation in simulated environments (University of Edinburgh, UK)
by Stefano V. Albrecht 12 Dec '23

12 Dec '23

Postdoctoral Research Fellowship Position “Reinforcement learning and imitation learning for robot navigation in simulated environments” About the position We are seeking a motivated candidate to fill a postdoctoral research fellow position in “Reinforcement learning and imitation learning for robot navigation in simulated environments”. This position will be hosted and located in the Autonomous Agents Research Group (https://agents.inf.ed.ac.uk) in the School of Informatics, University of Edinburgh, United Kingdom. The researcher will be supervised jointly by Prof. Stefano V. Albrecht (University of Edinburgh) and Prof. Concetto Spampinato (University of Catania). What will you be doing Contribute to the project through research activities, including: • Conduct a comprehensive literature review to understand the current state-of-the-art in reinforcement learning, imitation learning, and robot navigation. • Develop novel reinforcement learning and imitation learning algorithms tailored to the specific challenges of robot navigation in our simulated environment MIDGARD (https://midgardsim.org/). • Design, together with engineers, more realistic and diverse simulated environments that capture the complexities of real-world scenarios in MIDGARD. • Develop evaluation metrics and protocols to assess the performance of reinforcement learning and imitation learning algorithms in these environments. • Define and validate methods for sim-to-real challenges that may arise in the transition from simulation to physical robots. This activity will be carried out jointly with robotics researchers. Candidate requirements PhD in AI, machine learning, computer science, or related area. Excellent publication track record in leading conferences for AI/ML/robotics research. Background and expertise in one or more of the following areas: • RL and imitation learning algorithms • Knowledge of robotic systems and challenges in navigation • Solid foundation in machine and deep learning concepts and techniques • Proficient in Python and Pytorch algorithm development Employment package 12 months initially, with option to extend to 36 months subject to performance review. Standard salary for research postdoc in Italy (1.500 Euros/month). Accommodation costs (i.e. rent) are additionally covered. Paid trips to conferences to present work. Desktop/laptop computer. How to apply Interested candidates are encouraged to contact the PeRCeiVe Lab research admin at alessia.spitaleri(a)unict.it<mailto:alessia.spitaleri@unict.it> for further details on how to apply and support with the application process. For questions about the position and research, please contact Prof. Stefano Albrecht (s.albrecht(a)ed.ac.uk<mailto:s.albrecht@ed.ac.uk>) and Prof. Concetto Spampinato (concetto.spampinato(a)unict.it<mailto:concetto.spampinato@unict.it>). Applications close: December 27th 2023 at noon (Italian time) -- Dr. Stefano V. Albrecht Associate Professor, School of Informatics, University of Edinburgh Head of Autonomous Agents Research Group (https://agents.inf.ed.ac.uk) Royal Society Industry Fellow, Five AI/Bosch (www.five.ai<http://www.five.ai>) Royal Academy of Engineering Industrial Fellow, Dematic/KION (www.dematic.com<http://www.dematic.com>) The University of Edinburgh is a charitable body, registered in Scotland, with registration number SC005336. Is e buidheann carthannais a th’ ann an Oilthigh Dhùn Èideann, clàraichte an Alba, àireamh clàraidh SC005336.

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Call for Posters: ISAIM 2024 Special Session on Deep Reinforcement Learning
by Diochnos, Dimitrios 10 Dec '23

10 Dec '23

Call for Posters: International Symposium on Artificial Intelligence and Mathematics (ISAIM) 2024 Special Session on Deep Reinforcement Learning Submission: https://forms.gle/MJuSJHJpuJ3mFevf6 Workshop Theme: "Deep Reinforcement Learning: Bridging Theory and Practice" https://isaim-deeprl.github.io/2024/ Dates & Venue: January 8, 9, 2024, collocated with the International Symposium on Artificial Intelligence and Mathematics (ISAIM), Fort Lauderdale, FL. Overview: Deep Reinforcement Learning (DRL) stands at the forefront of AI research, shaping the future of diverse fields from robotics to finance. However, the journey from theoretical foundations to practical applications in DRL is laden with challenges. Our workshop, a special session of ISAIM 2024, aims to address these challenges by fostering a deeper understanding and appreciation of the latest advancements in DRL. We will discuss a variety of talks (including but not limited to) sample efficiency, exploration vs. exploitation, transfer learning, stability and convergence, and real-world application barriers. Invited Speakers: Benjamin Eysenbach (Princeton) Aviral Kumar (CMU / Google) Pulkit Agrawal (MIT) Chi Jin (Princeton) Sanjiban Choudhury (Cornell) Wen Sun (Cornell) Kaiqing Zhang (UMD) Max Simchowitz (MIT) Animesh Garg (Georgia Tech) Zhuoran Yang (Yale) Objective: Our goal is to illuminate the connection between the theoretical and practical aspects of DRL, addressing inherent challenges in the field. Participants will gain comprehensive knowledge, backed by expert-led discussions, talks and lively interaction. Target Audience: This workshop is ideal for researchers, AI practitioners, graduate students, and industry professionals keen on exploring the forefront of Deep Reinforcement Learning. Call for Posters: We invite submissions for poster presentations that align with the theme of the workshop. This is an excellent opportunity to showcase your research, share novel ideas, and interact with experts in the field. There will be a lot of engaging discussion and all relevant work is welcome! Submission Guidelines: Poster topics should be relevant to DRL and its challenges. But this is defined very broadly, please submit if you think at all relevant! Abstracts should be concise, clearly outlining objectives, methodology, and findings. Include author(s) name, affiliation, and contact information. Flexible on format, 4+ page papers accepted! Submission Deadline: Jan 5, 2024 Contact Information: zhaoranwang(a)gmail.com or abhgupta(a)cs.washington.edu Join us in exploring the intricate world of DRL and contribute to bridging the gap between theory and practice. We look forward to your insightful contributions and lively discussions! Organizers: Abhishek Gupta (UW), Zhaoran Wang (Northwestern), Aldo Pacchiano (Boston University / Broad Institute), Claudio Gentile (Google)

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Robot Fleet Management with Open-RMF Training 2024
by Yuhong Lin 05 Dec '23

05 Dec '23

Final Call for Early Bird: Mastering Robot Fleet Management with Open-RMF Training (01/22-01/24, 2024) Dear Roboticists, Don't miss out on the final chance to secure your spot at the upcoming 4th edition of "Mastering Robot Fleet Management with Open-RMF Training," scheduled to be held online from January 22 to 24, 2024. *Training Details:* - *Dates*: January 22 - 24, 2024 - *Location*: Live Online Classes + Remote Real Robot Practice - *Time*: 9:00 – 18:00 Central European Time (CET) - *Limited Seats:* Only 15 participants - *Website*: https://www.theconstructsim.com/robot-fleet-management-ros2-open-rmf-traini… <https://www.theconstructsim.com/robot-fleet-management-ros2-open-rmf-traini…> *About the Training:* Join industry mentors for a 3-Day Live Training: Gain practical skills in configuring, deploying, and managing robot fleets with open-source software (Open-RMF), while learning how to apply it to your real multi-robot scenarios. *What You Will Learn:* - RMF basic structure - How to create a compliant RMF simulation - How to set up Free Fleet for autonomous mobile robots - How to set up basic tasks like Deliver, Clean, Patrol, and Charge - How to create your own custom fleet adapter to integrate API and ROS2 systems of your robot into RMF. - How to dock in RMF - How to clean with RMF - How to create a GUI for humans to interact with RMF *Training Highlights:* - Expert instruction from industry professionals - Hands-on experience with real robots - Interactive exercises with simulated robots - Practical application in a real multi-robot environment – Starbots Coffee Lab *Practical Sessions @ Starbots Coffee Lab:* Throughout the training, you will have the opportunity to apply your newfound knowledge in real-world scenarios at the Starbots Coffee Lab, a multi-robot system application. Learn more at https://www.theconstructsim.com/robot-fleet-management-ros2-open-rmf-traini… <https://www.theconstructsim.com/robot-fleet-management-ros2-open-rmf-traini…> . For any inquiries regarding this training, please feel free to contact us at info(a)theconstructsim.com. Best regards, The Construct team

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[meetings] ICSR 2023 - Registration for International Conference on Social Robotics
by Alessandra Rossi 25 Nov '23

25 Nov '23

Dear everyone, we would like to invite you to participate at the 15th International Conference on Social Robotics (ICSR 2023) that will be held in Doha, Qatar, on December 3-7, 2023. The theme of this year’s conference is *“Human-Robot Collaboration: Sea, Air, Land, Space and Cyberspace”.* The theme emphasizes on all physical and cyber-physical domains where humans and robots collaborate. Registration is open! It is possible to register for Online-Only Conference Participation (Dec 5-6). Includes: online participation for 1. Plenary conference talks 2. Podium conference talks. Registration info are https://icsr23.qa/registration/ The program details here: https://icsr23.qa/program/ <https://icsr23.qa/program/?fbclid=IwAR22qmwGNE4jV5aBrukQmDEdmRfvhFC4WAG2KN4…> best regards Alessandra

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[meetings][CFP] ICSR 2023: Adaptive Social Interaction based on user’s Mental mOdels and behaVior in HRI - ASIMOV Workshop
by Alessandra Rossi 23 Nov '23

23 Nov '23

****** Apologies for multiple emails - Errata corridge ******* ASIMOV Adaptive Social Interaction based on user’s Mental mOdels and behaVior in HRI the 15th International Conference on Social Robotics <https://icsr23.qa> 03-07 December 2023, Doha (Qatar) Important Dates - Deadline for Paper Submission: November 26th, 2023 - Paper Acceptance Notification: November 30th, 2023 - Camera Ready Paper: December 1st, 2023 - Main Conference Date: December 3rd–7th, 2023 - Workshop Date: December 4th, 2023 (14:00-17:00 - UCT+3) The ability to understand and adapt to people’s mental models is a key objective for enabling natural, efficient, and successful human-robot interaction (HRI), in particular in human-centered scenarios where robots are expected to meet people’s social conventions. Theory of mind and mental models are largely investigated in human-computer interactions, however, it is still unclear what level of others’ mental states a robot should be aware of in order to communicate with people in a transparent and socially acceptable way. The ASIMOV workshop will constitute a unique opportunity to gather roboticists and computer scientists to discuss a variety of current and new approaches aiming at endowing social robots with learning abilities, enhancing cognitive and social abilities based on mutual understanding (i.e. shared Theory of Mind). Target Audience This workshop is intended as a forum for a broad audience, which spans social and assistive robotics, cognitive and behavioral robotics, and social awareness and explainability in HRI. The workshop should be a place to exchange opinions, discuss innovative ideas, and get hints and suggestions on ongoing research, therefore contributing to tackling unresolved issues. The proposed topic brings together researchers working on user behavior and intention detection, human-robot interaction, social and assistive robotics, control interfaces, learning, and ethical and safety issues in human-machine interaction, among others. A large scientific community is involved in such research fields. Topics of interest include, but are not limited to, the following: - Mental models in HRI - Human-aware perception-action loop - Emotion and intention recognition - Empathy and Theory of Mind in Robotics - Mutual affective understanding - Real-time monitoring of behavior and mental states - Detection of non-verbal behavioral cues - Online adaptive behavior - Acceptability and personalization - Physiological monitoring and biofeedback systems - BCI (brain-computer interfaces)-enabled adaptive interaction - Short- and Long-term personalization - Human partnership and trust in HRI - Explainable AI in HRI - Security and safety in HRI Submission We welcome prospective participants to submit either full papers (up to 6 pages) or extended abstracts (up to 2 pages). Papers can be on research that the authors would like to discuss during the workshop, especially encouraging papers on new ideas or research that the authors plan to conduct. Possible topics of the submissions will cover a wide view of the state of the art. Workshop papers must clearly indicate that they are part of ASIMOV workshop. All material collected during the Workshop: video, slides, papers, etc. upon approval of the authors, will be made available on the workshop website. Selected papers will be invited to submit an extended/revised version of the papers for a special issue in a recognized international journal. We will propose to either the International Journal of Social Robotics or Paladyn Journal of Behavioural Robotics or Journal of Healthcare Engineering or IEEE Transactions on Medical Robotics and Bionics. It is highly recommended to use the Springer LNCS/LNAI style for the layout. Detailed instructions for paper submission are available on the conference website (https://icsr23.qa/paper-submission/). LNCS style templates are available on the Springer LNCS website. Each paper will receive two reviews. Accepted papers require that at least one of the authors register for the workshop. All submitted papers will be reviewed by two reviewers. The abstracts of the accepted papers will appear on the workshop website. Authors will be able to submit a PDF copy through EasyChair <https://easychair.org/my/conference?conf=asimov2023>. Invited Speakers - Prof. Agnieszka Wykowska, Italian Institute of Technology (Genoa, Italy) - Prof. Alessandro Di Nuovo, Sheffield Hallam University (UK) - Dr. Salvatore Anzalone, University of Paris 8 (Paris) Organising Committee - Mariacarla Staffa, University of Naples Parthenope (Italy), email: mariacarla.staffa(a)unipartenope.it - Alessandra Rossi, University of Napled Federico II (Italy), email: alessandra.rossi(a)unina.it - Antonio Andriella, Pal Robotics, Barcellona (Spain), email: antonio.andriella(a)pal-robotics.com - Maryam Alimardani, Tilburg University (The Netherlands), email: m.alimardani(a)tilburguniversity.edu - Lorenzo D'Errico, Università degli Studi di Napoli "Federico II" email: lorenzo.derrico(a)unina.it

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[RoboCup-athome] First Call for Participation | RoboCup@Home 2024 (DSPL · OPL · SSPL)
by Sven Wachsmuth 23 Nov '23

23 Nov '23

Please remind the on-coming deadline at Nov. 27 2023! First Call for Participation RoboCup@Home 2024 (DSPL · OPL · SSPL) July 15 to 21, 2024 (Eindhoven, Netherlands) https://2024.robocup.org https://athome.robocup.org/ https://athome.robocup.org/2024-cfp1-all/ <https://athome.robocup.org/> https://github.com/RoboCupAtHome/RuleBook RoboCup is an international scientific initiative with the goal to advance the state of the art of intelligent robots through competitions (RoboCup@Home, RoboCup Soccer, RoboCup Rescue, RoboCup@Work and RoboCup Junior). The RoboCup@Home league aims to develop service and assistive robot technology with high relevance for future personal domestic applications. It is the largest international annual competition for autonomous service robots and is part of the RoboCup initiative. A set of benchmark tests is used to evaluate the robots’ abilities and performance in a realistic home environment setting. Focus lies on the following domains but is not limited to: Human-Robot-Interaction and Cooperation, Navigation and Mapping in dynamic environments, Computer Vision and Object Recognition under natural light conditions, Object Manipulation, Adaptive Behaviors, Behavior Integration, Ambient Intelligence, Standardization and System Integration. Important dates: Oct. 12, 2023 Publication of the Call for Participation Oct. 30, 2023 Deadline for submission of participation intention (optional). Nov. 27, 2023 Deadline for submission of qualification material (Team Description Paper, Team Video, Team Website). Jan. 08, 2024 Qualification announcement Jan. 29, 2024 Deadline for Participation Confirmation Further information is published in the Call for Participation: https://athome.robocup.org/2024-cfp1-all/ With kind regards, and looking forward to see your team in Eindhoven, The 2024 RoboCup@Home Organizing and Technical Committees

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[meetings][CFP] ICSR 2023: Adaptive Social Interaction based on user’s Mental mOdels and behaVior in HRI - ASIMOV Workshop
by Alessandra Rossi 22 Nov '23

22 Nov '23

ASIMOV Adaptive Social Interaction based on user’s Mental mOdels and behaVior in HRI the 15th International Conference on Social Robotics <http://www.colips.org/conferences/icsr2021/wp/> 03-07 December 2023, Doha (Qatar) Important Dates - Deadline for Paper Submission: November 26th, 2023 - Paper Acceptance Notification: November 30th, 2023 - Camera Ready Paper: December 1st, 2023 - Main Conference Date: December 3rd–7th, 2023 - Workshop Date: December 4th, 2023 (14:00-17:00 - UCT+3) The ability to understand and adapt to people’s mental models is a key objective for enabling natural, efficient, and successful human-robot interaction (HRI), in particular in human-centered scenarios where robots are expected to meet people’s social conventions. Theory of mind and mental models are largely investigated in human-computer interactions, however, it is still unclear what level of others’ mental states a robot should be aware of in order to communicate with people in a transparent and socially acceptable way. The ASIMOV workshop will constitute a unique opportunity to gather roboticists and computer scientists to discuss a variety of current and new approaches aiming at endowing social robots with learning abilities, enhancing cognitive and social abilities based on mutual understanding (i.e. shared Theory of Mind). Target Audience This workshop is intended as a forum for a broad audience, which spans social and assistive robotics, cognitive and behavioral robotics, and social awareness and explainability in HRI. The workshop should be a place to exchange opinions, discuss innovative ideas, and get hints and suggestions on ongoing research, therefore contributing to tackling unresolved issues. The proposed topic brings together researchers working on user behavior and intention detection, human-robot interaction, social and assistive robotics, control interfaces, learning, and ethical and safety issues in human-machine interaction, among others. A large scientific community is involved in such research fields. Topics of interest include, but are not limited to, the following: - Mental models in HRI - Human-aware perception-action loop - Emotion and intention recognition - Empathy and Theory of Mind in Robotics - Mutual affective understanding - Real-time monitoring of behavior and mental states - Detection of non-verbal behavioral cues - Online adaptive behavior - Acceptability and personalization - Physiological monitoring and biofeedback systems - BCI (brain-computer interfaces)-enabled adaptive interaction - Short- and Long-term personalization - Human partnership and trust in HRI - Explainable AI in HRI - Security and safety in HRI Submission We welcome prospective participants to submit either full papers (up to 6 pages) or extended abstracts (up to 2 pages). Papers can be on research that the authors would like to discuss during the workshop, especially encouraging papers on new ideas or research that the authors plan to conduct. Possible topics of the submissions will cover a wide view of the state of the art. Workshop papers must clearly indicate that they are part of ASIMOV workshop. All material collected during the Workshop: video, slides, papers, etc. upon approval of the authors, will be made available on the workshop website. Selected papers will be invited to submit an extended/revised version of the papers for a special issue in a recognized international journal. We will propose to either the International Journal of Social Robotics or Paladyn Journal of Behavioural Robotics or Journal of Healthcare Engineering or IEEE Transactions on Medical Robotics and Bionics. It is highly recommended to use the Springer LNCS/LNAI style for the layout. Detailed instructions for paper submission are available on the conference website (https://www.icsr2022.it/paper-submission/). LNCS style templates are available on the Springer LNCS website. Each paper will receive two reviews. Accepted papers require that at least one of the authors register for the workshop. All submitted papers will be reviewed by two reviewers. The abstracts of the accepted papers will appear on the workshop website. Authors will be able to submit a PDF copy through EasyChair <https://easychair.org/conferences/?conf=asimov2022>. Invited Speakers - Prof. Agnieszka Wykowska, Italian Institute of Technology (Genoa, Italy) - Prof. Alessandro Di Nuovo, Sheffield Hallam University (UK) - Dr. Salvatore Anzalone, University of Paris 8 (Paris) Organising Committee - Mariacarla Staffa, University of Naples Parthenope (Italy), email: mariacarla.staffa(a)unipartenope.it - Alessandra Rossi, University of Napled Federico II (Italy), email: alessandra.rossi(a)unina.it - Antonio Andriella, Pal Robotics, Barcellona (Spain), email: antonio.andriella(a)pal-robotics.com - Maryam Alimardani, Tilburg University (The Netherlands), email: m.alimardani(a)tilburguniversity.edu

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Call for Nominations: ACM/SIGAI Autonomous Agents Research Award
by Nicholas Mattei 20 Nov '23

20 Nov '23

[Apologies for Multiple Postings] Nominations are solicited for the 2024 ACM SIGAI Autonomous Agents Research Award. This award is made for excellence in research in the area of autonomous agents. It is intended to recognize researchers in autonomous agents whose current work is an important influence on the field. The award is an official ACM award, funded by an endowment created by ACM SIGAI from the proceeds of previous Autonomous Agents conferences. The recipient of the award will receive a monetary prize and a certificate, and will be invited to present a plenary talk at the AAMAS 2024 conference. How to Nominate Anyone can make a nomination. Nominations should be made by filling out the below google form, and should consist of a short (< 1 page) statement that emphasizes not only the research contributions that the individual has made that merit the award but also how the individual’s current work is an important influence on the field. NOTE: a candidate can only be considered for the award if they are explicitly nominated. If you believe that someone deserves the award, then NOMINATE THEM — don’t assume that somebody else will! For any questions please contact Manuela Veloso (Award Chair, mmv(a)cs.cmu.edu) or Nicholas Mattei (SIGAI Vice Chair, nsmattei(a)gmail.com). Nomination Link: https://forms.gle/Fg4StTpk85sNKmdt5 Important Dates - 15 December 2023 — Deadline for nominations - 30 January 2024 — Announcement of winner - 6 – 10 May 2024 — AAMAS-2024 conference in Auckland, New Zealand --Nick -- *Nicholas Mattei* Assistant Professor, Tulane University nsmattei(a)tulane.edu | www.nickmattei.net Stanley Thomas Hall | 305B +1 504 865 5782 Department of Computer Science Tulane University 6823 St Charles Ave New Orleans, LA 70118

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[meetings][CFP][ICSR 2023] Call For Robot Design Competitions
by Alessandra Rossi 18 Nov '23

18 Nov '23

Dear colleagues, We are very pleased to invite you to participate in the Robot Design Competition at the 15th International Conference of Social Robotics (ICSR 2023 <https://icsr23.qa/>) that will be held in Doha, Qatar on December 4-7, 2023. Please find below the full call. -> https://icsr23.qa/competitions/ More information can also be found on the website and social media: website: https://icsr23.qa/ IG: @icsr23_qa Twitter: @icsr23_qa Facebook: @icsr2023 ICSR 2023 conference Kind regards, Alessandra Rossi Publicity Chair ******************* Apologies for cross-posting ******************** [image: image.png] *International Conference on Social Robotics* December 4-7, 2023, Doha, Qatar https://icsr23.qa IG: @icsr23_qa Twitter: @icsr23_qa Facebook: @icsr2023 ============================================================================== *IMPORTANT DATES* *Entry Submission: November 25, 2023* *Finalists Notification: November 30, 2023 * *Winner Announcement: December 7, 2023* The design and development of various kinds of robots, and their intelligence and behavior have been evolving continuously. The new era of robotics is witnessing the increasing release of new innovative robots with a diverse set of applications. Especially, the past few years have provided more recognition to robots and their importance in various domains of life. - How can robots be part of our life, enrich our life experience, assist, serve and entertain us? - Where is the new generation of these social robots heading? What are the innovative societal applications? What impact are they capable of making? - What are the key enabling technologies that are being improved? - How do we see greater involvement of useful robots in education, wellbeing, space, tourism, and various other sectors? *SUBMISSION* If you have a solid idea/working prototype, send your entries to the flagship Robot Design Competition, organized by ICSR 2023, which is now under the Global Robotics, Art, and Science Synergies (GRASS). We also encourage cross-disciplinary experts/teams to bring impactful solutions for the betterment of society. Each submission should have a (maximum) 2-page summary. The template is flexible; however, it should include a concise abstract/synopsis of a maximum of 50 words, and enough details to judge the technical novelty of the proposed solution and/or innovative applications of robots. A single link of related video can be included. Video link is optional, and the maximum duration of the video should be 3 minutes. Keep in mind it is not a scientific publication, but the description of a robotics innovation with potential to be developed as a project. Competition chairs, with the help from experts and reviewers, will select the finalists. Each finalist is supposed to register and present their entry at a dedicated session in the conference, which will be further evaluated by the Jury of peers. Email your submission at icsr23(a)qu.edu.qa with the subject line starting with: [ICSR 2023 Competition] *REWARDS AND AWARDS* Winners and runners-up in the following categories will be selected : *Innovative Idea*: The entries, which are innovative but are in the early stages of conceptualization will be considered for this category. *Innovative Solution*: The entries, which have demonstrated maturity of the proposed solution through prototypes will be considered for this category. *Innovative Application: *The entries, which have targeted specific applications through robotics solutions will be considered for this category. *Benefits to the finalists:* - Dedicated slot to present during the final round in the conference. - A unique opportunity to exhibit the entry during the conference in the exhibition areas, through looped video display. - Opportunity to have post-event mentorship through industry and academics experts. *Certificate and Prize:* For each category, the winners and runners-up will be awarded with certificates and prize money of USD 300 and USD 200 respectively. *COMPETITION CHAIR* Amit Kumar Pandey, Rovial Space, France

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Initial Call for Participation: The 2024 IEEE-RAS Response Robotics Seasonal School and Workshop
by Raymond Sheh 08 Nov '23

08 Nov '23

Hi All! We are delighted to announce our next Response Robotics Seasonal School and Workshop, to be held in March 2024! Please see below for the current Call for Participation and visit https://responserobotics.org for the latest updates. Please do forward this on to any interested students and researchers and don't hesitate to contact us, either via the mailing list or Discord server on the website, or via email to info(a)responserobotics.org if you have any questions. Cheers! - Raymond Sheh ======== Initial Call for Participation ======== The 2024 IEEE-RAS Response Robotics Seasonal School and Workshop March 4-7, 2024 Reveille Proving Grounds, Burnet, TX, USA and Online Co-located with the 2024 Texas Public Safety Robotics Summit https://responserobotics.org | info(a)responserobotics.org === Introduction: === The 2024 IEEE-RAS Response Robotics Seasonal School and Workshop (RRSS+W) is a 4-day-long immersive academic research event for undergraduate and graduate research students, mentors of high school research robotics teams, and early career researchers, on the challenges and best-in-class solutions for applied response robotics. It is financially sponsored by the IEEE-RAS and student travel support scholarships are available for IEEE-RAS students. It is co-located with the 2024 Texas Public Safety Robotics Summit (TXPS, https://www.txpsrobots.com/ ), a high profile industry event for responders, manufacturers, and government agencies. Attendees of the RRSS+W will have a unique opportunity to engage with and learn from the end users about how their technologies might be used, manufacturers on the challenges of transitioning technologies from the lab into the real world, and various regulatory bodies on the risk management and legal landscape within which these technologies must operate. === Format: === In-person and online participants in the RRSS+W will have the opportunity to participate in lectures and panel discussions on topics ranging from theoretical techniques to real world applications. In addition, in-person participants will have the opportunity to participate in: - Hands-on practical sessions that give attendees an in-depth opportunity learn about a specific topic. - Demonstration and test sessions that allow attendees to deploy their own robots within the test methods and scenarios, and observe other robots being tested. - A workshop poster session that allows attendees to present their work to other attendees as well as the attendees of the TXPS, including those who may have an interest in adopting these technologies. - Social events that promote networking between RRSS+W attendees as well as the rest of the response robotics ecosystem. === Topics: === This year will highlight three topics that have been identified as being of particular up-and-coming interest in the response robotics space. We are particularly soliciting the involvement of students who are interested in these topics. - Novel communication technologies for challenging response environments. - Integration of Uncrewed Aircraft Systems (aka UAS, RPAS, or aerial drones) into response robotics applications. - Cybersecurity and Artificial Intelligence (AI) Risk Management Challenges for the Response Robotics ecosystem. We are also encouraging students who are interested in broader response robotics topics to attend, including, but not limited to: - 3D mapping and indoor/outdoor navigation in unstructured environments. - Mobility in challenging terrain and among 3D obstacles. - Dexterous manipulation and inspection. - Transition of technologies into real world unstructured environments. - Novel sensors for response robotics. The RRSS+W will also host a roadmap discussion for the RoboCupRescue Robot League, with a focus on engaging with the end user community. We invite past, present, and prospective competitors to join us! === Venue: === The venue hosts both real world scenarios, complete with the uncertainty, weather, and communications challenges that it brings, as well as standard test methods that provide repeatable, reproducible, evaluations of robot capabilities that attendees can replicate in their own labs. Attendees will have a unique opportunity to observe robots of their interest performing in both the scenarios and the test methods, as well as bring their own robots to test and refine over the course of the event. Please check the website and join the mailing list for updates regarding accommodation and transportation arrangements. === Registration and Timelines: === The registration fee for in-person attendance is $300 and includes registration for the broader TXPS. As space is limited, registration is capped and competitive, based on a 1 page cover letter describing their research and how they see their developments assisting responders. Registration will be decided on a rolling basis and closes February 1st, 2024, or when the event reaches capacity so we advise prospective attendees to register early. IEEE-RAS students may use the same letter to apply for a limited number of competitive travel support scholarships that include the fee and a stipend. This is based on a sliding scale, with the goal of partially compensating for the higher travel cost incurred by students from more distant institutions. Travel support applications will be decided on a rolling basis and closes December 31st, 2023, or when all funds have been allocated. Registration details are still being finalized. We encourage interested attendees to email info(a)responserobotics.org with their expression of interest and cover letter. We will follow up when the registration details are finalized. Remote attendance of the lectures will be free of charge, dependent on connectivity. Join the mailing list or keep an eye on the website for details. === Contact: === See https://responserobotics.org for further details, and to join our mailing list and Discord server. Email info(a)responserobotics.org for any questions. -- Dr. Raymond Sheh Uncrewed Aircraft Systems Research Lead and Guest Researcher UAS Portfolio, Public Safety Communications Research Division Communications Technology Laboratory National Institute of Standards and Technology U.S. Department of Commerce 100 Bureau Drive, Stop 8230, Gaithersburg MD 20899-8230, USA Adjunct Associate Research Scientist Whiting School of Engineering Johns Hopkins University Columbia MD, USA Trustee, RoboCup Federation

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[news][training] Robot Fleet Management with Open-RMF Training 2024
by Yuhong Lin 06 Nov '23

06 Nov '23

Call for Participation: Mastering Robot Fleet Management with Open-RMF Training (01/22-01/24, 2024) Dear Roboticists, We are thrilled to announce the 4th "Mastering Robot Fleet Management with Open-RMF Training," scheduled to take place online from January 22 to 24, 2024. Join us from anywhere in the world to learn and gain hands-on experience with Open-RMF. *Training Details:* - *Dates*: 22 – 24 January 2024 - *Location*: Live Online Classes + Remote Real Robot Practice - *Time*: 9:00 – 18:00 Central European Time (CET) - *Seats*: Limited to 15 participants - *Website*: https://www.theconstructsim.com/robot-fleet-management-ros2-open-rmf-traini… <https://www.theconstructsim.com/robot-fleet-management-ros2-open-rmf-traini…> *About the Training:* Join industry mentors for a 3-Day Live Training: Gain practical skills in configuring, deploying, and managing robot fleets with open-source software (Open-RMF), while learning how to apply it to your real multi-robot scenarios. *What You Will Learn:* - RMF basic structure - How to create a compliant RMF simulation - How to set up Free Fleet for autonomous mobile robots - How to set up basic tasks like Deliver, Clean, Patrol, and Charge - How to create your own custom fleet adapter to integrate API and ROS2 systems of your robot into RMF. - How to dock in RMF - How to clean with RMF - How to create a GUI for humans to interact with RMF *Training Highlights:* - Expert instruction from industry professionals - Hands-on experience with real robots - Interactive exercises with simulated robots - Practical application in a real multi-robot environment – Starbots Coffee Lab *Practical Sessions @ Starbots Coffee Lab:* Throughout the training, you will have the opportunity to apply your newfound knowledge in real-world scenarios at the Starbots Coffee Lab, a multi-robot system application. Learn more at https://www.theconstructsim.com/robot-fleet-management-ros2-open-rmf-traini… <https://www.theconstructsim.com/robot-fleet-management-ros2-open-rmf-traini…> . For any inquiries regarding this training, please feel free to contact us at info(a)theconstructsim.com. Best regards, The Construct team

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