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SUMMARY:Making Real-World Multi-Robot Systems More Practical - Dr Ajay Sha
 nkar\, Computer Laboratory\, Cambridge
DTSTART:20231212T120000Z
DTEND:20231212T130000Z
UID:TALK209488@talks.cam.ac.uk
CONTACT:Slawomir Tadeja
DESCRIPTION:Abstract:\n\nThere is a leap to be made when going from multi-
 ‘agent' to multi-‘robot’ problems: the reality of our systems and co
 mponents (such as locomotion\, sensing\, inter-agent communication\, etc) 
 kicks in and undercuts several theoretical developments we otherwise rely 
 upon. Complete system integration is thus key to realising multi-robot tea
 ms that are robust and resilient in practice\, and this requires careful d
 esign choices not only in the engineering aspects but also in the theoreti
 cal abstractions we choose for them. For instance\, lots of work in multi-
 agent coordination assumes synchronous communications (which is completely
  impractical beyond lab spaces)\, and perhaps a better architecture might 
 prevent agents from being too dependent on it (and retain a certain degree
  of autonomy when comms fail). In this talk\, I will present two recent ar
 eas of work by which we have tackled and relaxed some of the assumptions i
 mplicitly made in multi-robot problems. The first of these embeds diversit
 y in multi-robot teams (with reinforcement learning) and thus makes them r
 esilient in practice. The second allows two airborne multirotor systems to
  dock with each other by efficiently learning to compensate for aerodynami
 c effects.\n\nSpeakers Bio: \n\nI am a post-doc in the Department of Compu
 ter Sc. and Technology at the University of Cambridge (UK)\, and I work wi
 th Dr Amanda Prorok at the ProrokLab (proroklab.org). I completed my PhD a
 t the University of Nebraska-Lincoln (USA)\, where I was at the Nimbus Lab
  (nimbus.unl.edu) and developed aerial robotic systems that make tactile i
 nteractions with dynamic objects in their surroundings as well as with eac
 h other in the air. My work is driven mostly by field robotics and applica
 tions\, and I also develop full-stack systems that are meant for studying 
 and monitoring our natural environment. In my recent work\, I have been mo
 re interested in developing real-world systems at larger scales that still
  operate with a high degree of autonomy and robustness. Please find more a
 t https://www.cl.cam.ac.uk/~as3233/\n
LOCATION:Institute of Manufacturing (IfM)\, Seminar Room 1
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