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RoboCup International Symposium 2022 - 2nd Call for Satellite Events
by Maike Paetzel-Prüsmann 21 Mar '22

21 Mar '22

* 2nd Call for Satellite Events * RoboCup International Symposium 2022 https://2022.robocup.org/symposium-call-for-satellite-events/ Submission of proposals: 3 April 2022 Notification to authors: 25 April 2022 Satellite Events: 17 or 18 July 2022 (RoboCup 2022: 11-17 July 2022) =========================================================== We invite you to organize a satellite event for the 25th RoboCup International Symposium, which will be held on 17 July 2022, in conjunction with RoboCup 2022 (11 July to 17 July 2022) in a hybrid setting. The RoboCup symposium is an annual event in which innovative, original research with relevance to areas of robotics and artificial intelligence is presented. The Symposium Program Co-Chairs would like to facilitate the organization of satellite workshops, focus groups, roundtable discussions, and other events that are related to RoboCup itself or the general aim of the RoboCup Symposium. This includes league-specific discussions about rules and/or roadmaps, shared infrastructure projects between leagues, as well as scientific workshops focusing on a particular research topic, among others. League committee members, as well as teams or individuals from RoboCup leagues participating in the Symposium, are invited to submit their proposals. The organizers of a satellite event are free to propose events between 2 and 8 hours in length to be held during or a day after the RoboCup Symposium (17 or 18 July) in a fully virtual, hybrid, or fully local format. IMPORTANT DATES =============== Submission of satellite events: 3 April 2022 Notification to authors: 25 April 2022 Satellite Events: 17 or 18 July 2022 (RoboCup 2022: 11-17 July 2022) SUBMISSION AND PROCEEDINGS ========================== Proposals will be evaluated by the Symposium Program Co-Chairs based on their thematic relevance to the RoboCup Symposium as well as their proposed schedule and required resources. Satellite events will not be included in the RoboCup Symposium proceedings. Proposals should be formatted following the LNAI author guidelines [0] and must be electronically submitted through the EasyChair electronic submission system [1]. Please follow the LaTeX template created by us by either downloading the template file [2] or by creating a private copy of this Overleaf template [3]. Submissions are limited to a 4-page extended abstract, excluding references. Each submission must include the following sections: * Name of the satellite event * A description of the format (e.g., discussion group, workshop, tutorial, invited talks, ...) and intended length of the event * Prefered date and time of the event (17 or 18; morning or afternoon, or the whole day [no lunch will be provided unless it’s on the 17th]) * A description of the content and aim of the satellite event * Names and contacts of all members of the organizing committee/group with one clearly marked person as the corresponding member of the organizing committee * The intended audience and the number of participants expected * Any resources required to organize the workshop After the acceptance of their proposal, organizers are expected to create a short description of their event as well as a website providing further information which will both be linked from the RoboCup symposium page on the RoboCup 2022 website. Organizers of accepted proposals for satellite events will receive a location for their event as well as other required resources (e.g., a projector), if possible. Apart from this, the organizers are responsible for organizing their event independent of the RoboCup Symposium. PROGRAM CO-CHAIRS ================== Maike Paetzel-Prüsmann, University of Potsdam, Germany Nuno Lau, University of Aveiro, Portugal Thanapat Wanichanon, Mahidol University, Thailand Amy Eguchi, University of California San Diego, USA CONTACT ======= robocupsymposium2022(a)easychair.org [0] https://www.springer.com/gp/computer-science/lncs/conference-proceedings-gu… [1] https://easychair.org/conferences/?conf=robocupsymposium2022 [2] https://2022.robocup.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/02/Symposium-Satellite-Eve… [3] https://de.overleaf.com/read/gqspxdtvpwsn

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European RoboCupJunior 2022 and European Middle Size League Championship 2022
by A. Fernando Ribeiro 16 Mar '22

16 Mar '22

*European RoboCupJunior 2022* and *European Middle Size League Championship 2022* Call for Participation https://2022.robocupjunior.eu 1 - 4 June 2022 Guimarães, Portugal (Multiusos de Guimarães) (GPS: 41.43547511153526, -8.3062854116528) ------ Leagues under competition (international teams) --------- Competitions are offered in the following leagues: - RoboCupJunior Soccer (Lightweight, Open, Entry) - RoboCupJunior OnStage (Advanced, Preliminary) - RoboCupJunior Rescue (Line, Line Entry, Maze, Maze Entry) - Co-Space Rescue Simulator - RoboParty Fun Challenge - SSL Junior - RoboCup@Home Educational - Middle Size League The registration opens *** 18 April 2022 ***. The registration closes *** 16 May 2022 ***. Visit https://2022.robocupjunior.eu/ to register your team. Details on the registration (fee, accommodation, rules) are available on the website. The Leagues Chairs: - SoccerJunior: Alexandrino Silva (soccer(a)2022.robocupjunior.eu) - RescueJunior: Luis Bernardino (rescue(a)2022.robocupjunior.eu) - OnStage: Rui Baptista (onstage(a)2022.robocupjunior.eu) - RoboParty Fun Challenge: Tiago Ribeiro (roboparty_fc(a)2022.robocupjunior.eu ) - SSL Junior: Laurent Verdier (laurent.verdier(a)elektronslibres.fr) - RoboCup@Home Educational: Inês Garcia (home_edu(a)2022.robocupjunior.eu) - Middle Size League: Vitor Pinto (vitorpinto(a)fe.up.pt) ------------ Important dates ----------------------------------- 18.04.2022 Registration opens 16.05.2022 Registration deadline - names, team, registration fee 01.06.2022 Set-up day Junior League teams 02.06.2022 Competition day (open to the public) 03.06.2022 Competition day (open to the public) 04.06.2022 Competition day, finals (open to the public) Please contact info(a)2022.robocupjunior.eu for any questions. See you all in Portugal at the *European RoboCupJunior 2022* and *European Middle Size League Championship 2022*. Best regards, Prof. A.Fernando Ribeiro (Chair and RoboCup Trustee) Organized by: Botnroll, Guimarães City Council, University of Minho

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Late call for applications to participate on-site and remotely in RoboCup 2022 Standard Platform League
by Stefan Seering 16 Mar '22

16 Mar '22

Dear SPL Teams, This email is a*late call for applications to participate *in RoboCup 2022 Standard Platform League in some capacity, either on-site as normal or remotely in a limited capacity. While we encourage all teams that are able to travel, even with a small number of member, to join us in Bangkok, the TC is aware that some teams have limitations on their ability to travel to Bangkok for the 2022 competition. Therefore, we would also like to encourage as many teams as possible to participate in RoboCup, whether on-site or in a remote setting. This is to maintain connections with the teams in our community and encourage teams to continue in their RoboCup research and software development. Teams competing on-site will be able to participate in the soccer competition and challenges. Teams that compete remotely, would be able to participate only in the following technical challenges: * Visual Referee Challenge * Dynamic Ball handling Challenge * Open Research Challenge Remote teams will be unable to participate in the soccer competition, or the 7 vs 7 Technical Challenge. This is because of limited on-site technical and volunteer support, along with an insufficient pool of robots. If you have questions about this late call for applications to participate on-site or remotely, please email the RoboCup TC (rc-spl-tc(a)lists.robocup.org). Additionally, if you are unsure about the teams status and unable to apply by the deadline, but may wish to make a late application, please express your interest in a late application by the deadline. Details of the call follow below: Late call for applications to participate in RoboCup 2022 Standard Platform League spl.robocup.org <https://spl.robocup.org/> Monday 11th July through Sunday 17th July 2022 Bangkok, Thailand 2022.robocup.org <https://2022.robocup.org/> RoboCup <https://spl.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, RoboCupJunior) involving mostly multi-robot systems. RoboCup 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, i.e., robots that operate with no external control. In this late call we encourage applications to participate in the RoboCup 2022 SPL either on-site in Bangkok or remotely. On-site participation The SPL at RoboCup 2022 will use V6, V5 or older versions of the NAO humanoid robot manufactured by SoftBank Robotics <https://www.softbankrobotics.com/emea/en/nao>. The SPL robot soccer team competition games at RoboCup 2022 will be played indoor and outdoor between teams of five robots on a 6m x 9m playing surface. Teams should be able to play on a randomly assigned indoor or outdoor field within one hour. The RoboCup 2022 SPL will host: * A 5 vs. 5 team competition as the main competition of the event. * A 7 vs. 7 competition. * A visual referee technical challenge. * A dynamic ball handling technical challenge. * A video analysis and statistics open research challenge. The 5 vs. 5 team competition will consist of a similar number of games for most teams compared to recent years. The structure from 2019 will be used to allow all teams to play games against teams with similar skill levels. See Appendix A.4 of the preliminary rulebook <https://spl.robocup.org/downloads/> for more details. The teams participating in the team competition should also compete in some of the additional technical challenges. The 7 vs. 7 side competition extends the ideas from the mixed team competition, and 1 vs. 1 remote challenge from RoboCup 2021 to a standardized 7 vs. 7 NAO V6 on-site competition. Its goal is to encourage more collaborative game play and offer a chance for teams to work together more closely. Participating in 7 vs. 7 is recognized as participation in a technical challenge. Additional technical challenges offered at the competition are the visual referee challenge and the dynamic ball handling challenge. The open research challenge aims to provide the SPL with long term performance statistics based on video analysis. Please note that the open research challenge comes with additional deadlines as mentioned in the rulebook. All challenges will be detailed further with the release of the SPL rules document. To assist in adoption of 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 working with V6 Robots in the code released by participating teams. These examples allow teams to adapt their competition code from recent years more easily to encourage use of V6 Robots. If you need access to the RoboCup NAOqi Image and the specific documentation, please write an email (mentioning your team affiliation) to rc-spl-tc(a)lists.robocup.org <mailto:rc-spl-tc@lists.robocup.org>. Remote participation in challenges For those teams that are not able to travel and compete on-site, we offer the possibility of remote participation in the following challenges: * Visual Referee Technical Challenge * Dynamic Ball handling Technical Challenge * A video analysis and statistics open research challenge Remote teams will be unable to participate in the soccer competition, or the 7 vs 7 Technical Challenge. Teams that wish to compete remotely may do so via a live stream of their technical challenge performance at their assigned time, similar to participation in RoboCup 2021. (For the dynamic ball handling challenge the TC is currently considering a limited on-site robot pool to allow teams to participate if they do not have 6 functional robots with which to conduct the challenge demonstration. However, a final decision on this has not yet been made.) Qualification All interested teams (whether participating on-site or remotely) must submit an original qualification document. For the qualification document to be considered, it must (1) be no longer than *6 pages* and (2) include all the following information in *sections with the specified headings*: 1. *Team Information:* the team name, the team leader(s), and the university/company affiliation(s) of the team 2. *Code Usage:* Acknowledge the team’s use of any other team’s code (1) previously from 2017 to present and (2) anticipated at RoboCup 2022. 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/>. 3. *Own Contribution:* Describe in detail the ‘research publishable’ significant advancements the applying team has made and is going to use at RoboCup 2022, in accordance with the rule book, section A.1 <https://spl.robocup.org/downloads/>. 4. *Past History:* provide game results in RoboCup Open competitions as well as main RoboCup competitions from 2018 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 2022. 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. *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 2019 or any challenge at RoboCup 2021 *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. 7. *Other:* Present any other information that you believe supports your application. If your application mentions more than one e-mail address, please specify which one should be used to contact your team regarding your application. Submission and Evaluation All applications with the (pre-)qualification material must be submitted by*13**th of April 2022*, by email to rc-spl-tc(a)lists.robocup.org <mailto:rc-spl-tc@lists.robocup.org>. Applications must not be sent to personal SPL TC/OC email addresses and must not contain video attachments. Note that applying serves as a statement of commitment to participate in the RoboCup 2022 SPL. The organizing committees are aware of the ongoing COVID situation and assume that all applications are subject to withdrawal due to COVID. Applications are not required to mention uncertainties related to COVID to avoid negative effects on future applications. We would rather encourage teams to plan optimistically and sign up with the possibility of withdrawing if situation requires it. For situations other than COVID: 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. 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 to consider a variety of components including: 1. Potential to play competitive games or participate in challenges at RoboCup 2022 (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.) Late qualification decisions will be announced shortly after the late application deadline above. 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 2022 Standard Platform League Technical and Organizing Committees/ / /

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

15 Mar '22

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

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

14 Mar '22

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

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

10 Mar '22

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

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

08 Mar '22

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

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

05 Mar '22

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

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

04 Mar '22

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

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RoboCup International Symposium 2022 - Call for Satellite Events
by Maike Paetzel-Prüsmann 24 Feb '22

24 Feb '22

* Call for Satellite Events * RoboCup International Symposium 2022 https://2022.robocup.org/symposium-call-for-satellite-events/ Submission of proposals: 3 April 2022 Notification to authors: 25 April 2022 Satellite Events: 17 or 18 July 2022 (RoboCup 2022: 11-17 July 2022) =========================================================== We invite you to organize a satellite event for the 25th RoboCup International Symposium, which will be held on 17 July 2022, in conjunction with RoboCup 2022 (11 July to 17 July 2022) in a hybrid setting. The RoboCup symposium is an annual event in which innovative, original research with relevance to areas of robotics and artificial intelligence is presented. The Symposium Program Co-Chairs would like to facilitate the organization of satellite workshops, focus groups, roundtable discussions, and other events that are related to RoboCup itself or the general aim of the RoboCup Symposium. This includes league-specific discussions about rules and/or roadmaps, shared infrastructure projects between leagues, as well as scientific workshops focusing on a particular research topic, among others. League committee members, as well as teams or individuals from RoboCup leagues participating in the Symposium, are invited to submit their proposals. The organizers of a satellite event are free to propose events between 2 and 8 hours in length to be held during or a day after the RoboCup Symposium (17 or 18 July) in a fully virtual, hybrid, or fully local format. IMPORTANT DATES =============== Submission of satellite events: 3 April 2022 Notification to authors: 25 April 2022 Satellite Events: 17 or 18 July 2022 (RoboCup 2022: 11-17 July 2022) SUBMISSION AND PROCEEDINGS ========================== Proposals will be evaluated by the Symposium Program Co-Chairs based on their thematic relevance to the RoboCup Symposium as well as their proposed schedule and required resources. Satellite events will not be included in the RoboCup Symposium proceedings. Proposals should be formatted following the LNAI author guidelines [0] and must be electronically submitted through the EasyChair electronic submission system [1]. Please follow the LaTeX template created by us by either downloading the template file [2] or by creating a private copy of this Overleaf template [3]. Submissions are limited to a 4-page extended abstract, excluding references. Each submission must include the following sections: * Name of the satellite event * A description of the format (e.g., discussion group, workshop, tutorial, invited talks, ...) and intended length of the event * Prefered date and time of the event (17 or 18; morning or afternoon, or the whole day [no lunch will be provided unless it’s on the 17th]) * A description of the content and aim of the satellite event * Names and contacts of all members of the organizing committee/group with one clearly marked person as the corresponding member of the organizing committee * The intended audience and the number of participants expected * Any resources required to organize the workshop After the acceptance of their proposal, organizers are expected to create a short description of their event as well as a website providing further information which will both be linked from the RoboCup symposium page on the RoboCup 2022 website. Organizers of accepted proposals for satellite events will receive a location for their event as well as other required resources (e.g., a projector), if possible. Apart from this, the organizers are responsible for organizing their event independent of the RoboCup Symposium. PROGRAM CO-CHAIRS ================== Maike Paetzel-Prüsmann, University of Potsdam, Germany Nuno Lau, University of Aveiro, Portugal Thanapat Wanichanon, Mahidol University, Thailand Amy Eguchi, University of California San Diego, USA CONTACT ======= robocupsymposium2022(a)easychair.org [0] https://www.springer.com/gp/computer-science/lncs/conference-proceedings-gu… [1] https://easychair.org/conferences/?conf=robocupsymposium2022 [2] https://2022.robocup.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/02/Symposium-Satellite-Eve… [3] https://de.overleaf.com/read/gqspxdtvpwsn

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