PhD Thesis Proposal
Matt Zucker
PhD Student
Robotics Institute

A Data-Driven Approach to High Level Planning

Event Location: NSH 3305Abstract: Motion planning for complex systems such as legged robots and mobile manipulators has proven to be a difficult task for a variety of reasons: not only must planning software consider a high-dimensional configuration space, but it must reason dynamically about how to apply forces to the real world. Accomplishing such planning [...]

PhD Thesis Defense
Nathan D. Ratliff
Carnegie Mellon University

Learning to Search: Structured Prediction Techniques for Imitation Learning

Event Location: Newell Simon Hall 1507Abstract: Modern robots successfully manipulate objects, navigate rugged terrain, drive in urban settings, and play world-class chess. Unfortunately, programming these robots is challenging, time-consuming and expensive; the parameters governing their behavior are often unintuitive, even when the desired behavior is clear and easily demonstrated. Inspired by successful end-to-end learning systems [...]

PhD Thesis Proposal
Boris Sofman
Carnegie Mellon University

Online Learning Techniques for Improving Robot Navigation in Unfamiliar Domains

Event Location: Newell Simon Hall 1305Abstract: Many mobile robot applications require robots to act safely and intelligently in complex unfamiliar environments with little structure and limited or unavailable human supervision. As a robot is forced to operate in an environment that it was not engineered or trained for, various aspects of its performance will inevitably [...]

PhD Thesis Proposal
Anton Chechetka
Carnegie Mellon University

Algorithms for Answering Queries with Graphical Models

Event Location: Newell Simon Hall 1305Abstract: In numerous real world applications, from sensor networks to patient monitoring to intelligent buildings, probabilistic inference is necessary to make conclusions about the system in question in the face of uncertainty. The key problem in all those settings is to compute the probability distribution over some random variables of [...]

PhD Thesis Proposal
Ling Xu
Carnegie Mellon University

Graph Planning for Effective Environmental Coverage

Event Location: Newell Simon Hall 1305Abstract: Tasks such as street mapping and security surveillance seek a route that traverses a given space to perform a function. These task functions may involve mapping the space for accurate modeling, sensing the space for unusual activity, or processing the space for object detection. When these tasks are performed [...]