Looking For Graduate Students
I am looking for new students. My current research focus is enabling robots to learn strategies (tricks, hacks) to do tasks from direct instruction, googling and using the web, observation, and practice (reinforcement learning). Here is a web page describing tricks to open a stuck jar. Here are some videos with narration: one, two, and three. Here is what ChatGPT has to say:
Here are a few effective methods to open a stuck jar:
Rubber Grip or Rubber Band: Place a thick rubber band or wear a pair of rubber gloves for extra grip and twist the lid.
Hot Water: Run the lid under hot water for about 30 seconds. The heat causes the metal to expand, making the lid easier to open.
Tap the Lid: Firmly tap around the edges of the lid with a spoon or a butter knife to break the seal.
Use a Jar Opener Tool: If you have one, a jar opener can provide extra leverage to loosen the lid.
Break the Vacuum Seal: Insert the tip of a butter knife under the edge of the lid and gently twist to release the vacuum seal.
Bang the Bottom: Turn the jar upside down and firmly hit the bottom with the palm of your hand. This may break the seal and loosen the lid.
How do we enable robots to take advantage of this information? Research in this area involves perception (vision, speech, sounds, touch), language understanding, and physical reasoning. Robots can learn policies without understanding the underlying task physics using reinforcement learning. To what extent can robots acquire and use knowledge about task physics to guide and speed up learning?
Read more on Chris Atkeson’s Web Site.
