Google research award Hamidreza Kasaei

We congratulate Hamidreza winning this prestigious and competitive award! As it is a worldwide award and open to candidates across the world.

More information about this award is available online: https://research.google/outreach/research-scholar-program/ and https://research.google/outreach/research-scholar-program/recipients/

Title of the project: Continual Robot Learning in Human-centered Environments

Short abstract:

The role of robots in our society is increasingly crucial, as they assist us in various domains such as agriculture, healthcare, and homes. However, the current robot learning approaches require predefining a set of tasks for the robot prior to deployment. Recent studies have shown that end-to-end deep learning has the potential to reduce programming requirements, but it necessitates a significant amount of training data. While these methods perform well in pre-defined environments, any changes in tasks require complex and costly robot reprogramming by experts. In this project, I will try to find a way to eliminate the laborious programming and data collection processes by enabling robots to learn new tasks through imitation and interaction over time. Through extensive evaluation and demonstrations using a dual-arm robotic platform, I will assess how the robot can continuously enhance its understanding of the world and effectively adapt to new situations. My ultimate research vision is to create robots that can learn and contribute to improving people's lives on a daily basis, regardless of their location.

Webpage of Interactive Robot Learning (IRL) research group: https://www.ai.rug.nl/irl-lab/