Technical Activities Report

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Technical ActivitiesReport
Ken Goldberg, VP TA IEEE ICRA TAB,
Adcomm Orlando, FL May 20, 2006
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• TAB Report to Adcomm, 20 May 2006
• Introduction, TC chairs, DLs
• Selected RAS Technical Milestones
• Review of new TAB website and database
• Review of TCs
• TAB meeting, Young Professionals Lunch
• Most Active TC Award Intelligent Transport
  Systems
• (Alberto Broggi, Christian Laugier, Urbano Nunes)
  
• Proposal Establish 2 New TCs
• Algorithms for Planning and Control of Robot
  Motion
• Space Robotics
• Proposal Expanding DL program from 15 to 24 DLS
• Proposal Most Active DL Award (1000/year)
• Proposal Expand Young Professionals Lunch to
  IROS (5000/year)
• Proposal Approve TAB Charter
• (All Proposals Unanimously approved by TAB and
  Adcomm!)

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• RAS Technical Activities Board
• Ken Goldberg, VP Technical Activities
• goldberg_at_berkeley.edu
• RAS Officers
• 45 TC co-chairs
• 15 DLs
• Frank van der Stappen, Assoc. VPTA
• Katsu Yamane, Assoc. VPTA
• At-large members Tatsuo Arai, Alicia Casals,
  Satoshi Tadokoro, and Sebastian Thrun

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wabian
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4digitalbooks.com
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Nano-Assembly DNA Patterns, Paul Rothemund,
Caltech, March 2006
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(No Transcript)
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Springer Handbook of Robotics

• Bruno Siciliano
• Oussama Khatib
• Editors

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Pan-international Multi-disciplinary Authorship
Rachid Alami Jorge Angeles Fumihito Arai
Michael Arbib Haruhiko Asada Antonio Bicchi
John Billingsley Wayne Book Oliver Brock
Martin Buehler Cynthia Breazeal Alberto
Broggi Rodney Brooks Heinrich Bülthoff Joel
Burdick Wolfram Burgard Zack Butler
Fabrizio Caccavale Guy Campion Raja Chatila
François Chaumette Stefano Chiaverini Greg
Chirikjian Nak-Young Chong Edward Colgate
Peter Corke Henrik Christensen Wankyun Chung
Woojin Chung Jock Cunningham Mark Cutkosky
Kostas Daniliidis Paolo Dario Alessandro De
Luca Joris De Schutter Gregory Dudek Hugh
Durrant-Whyte Jan-Olof Eklundh Bernard Espiau
Roy Featherstone Eric Feron Paolo Fiorini
Robert Fisher Dario Floreano Li-Chen Fu
Masakatsu Fujie Robert Full José Maria Galván
Maxime Gautier Martin Giese Kenneth
Goldberg Martin Hägele Gregory Hager Aarne
Halme William Hamel Blake Hannaford Kensuke
Harada Vincent Hayward Martial Hebert Tom
Henderson Joachim Hertzberg Hirohisa Hirukawa
Gerd Hirzinger John Hollerbach Robert Howe
Phil Husbands Seth Hutchinson Hirochika
Inoue Michael Jenkin Shuuji Kajita Makoto
Kaneko Sungchul Kang Imin Kao Hami
Kazerooni Wisama Khalil Oussama Khatib
Lindsay Kleeman Tetsunori Kobayashi Dan
Koditschek Kurt Konolige David Kortenkamp
Kazuhiro Kosuge Roman Kuc James Kuffner
Vijay Kumar Jean-Paul Laumond Steve LaValle
John Leonard Kevin Lynch Alan Lytle Anthony
Maciejewski Maja Mataric Yoshio Matsumoto
Michael McCarthy Claudio Melchiorri
Jean-Pierre Merlet David Miller Javier
Minguez Pascal Morin Robin Murphy Yoshihiko
Nakamura Brad Nelson Günter Niemeyer
Stefano Nolfi Illah Nourbakhsh Jonathan
OBrien Allison Okamura David Orin Giuseppe
Oriolo George Pappas Michel Parent Frank
Park Lynne Parker Antonio Pascoal Michael
Peshkin Erwin Prassler Domenico Prattichizzo
Carsten Preusche William Provancher David
Reinkensmeyer Alfred Rizzi Jonathan Roberts
Daniela Rus Kamel Saidi Tim Salcudean
Claude Samson Victor Scheinman James
Schmiedeler Bruno Siciliano Roland Siegwart
Reid Simmons Dezhen Song Gaurav Sukhatme
Satoshi Tadokoro Atsuo Takanishi Russell
Taylor Charles Thorpe Sebastian Thrun James
Trevelyan Jeff Trinkle Masaru Uchiyama
Machiel van der Loos Gianmarco Veruggio Luigi
Villani Ken Waldron Brian Wilcox Jing Xiao
Mark Yim Kazuhito Yokoi Kazuya Yoshida
Junku Yuh Alex Zelinsky
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RAS Technical Activities Website

• TC Database
• Information on all Technical Committees
• Distinguished Lecturers Info
• TAB Charter
• Duties of TC Co-Chairs
• How to Propose a New TC
• Etc.

http//goldberg.berkeley.edu/vpta/
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http//thth.berkeley.edu/tab-db/
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RAS Distinguished Lecturers
Europe Wolfram Burgard Alicia Casals Jean Paul
Laumond Bruno Siciliano Roland Siegwart Americas N
ancy Amato Vijay Kumar Peter Luh Deirdre
Meldrum Metin Sitti
Asia and Pacific Hugh Durrant-Whyte Shuuji
Kajita Yoshihiko Nakamura Shigeki Sugano Michael
Wang
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RAS Technical Committees

• Aerial Unmanned Aerial Robotics
• Agricultural Robotics
• Bio-Robotics
• Comp. and Robot Vision
• Human-Robot Interaction
• Coordination
• Humanoid Robotics
• Intelligent Transportation
• Manufacturing Automation
• Micro/Nano Robotics
• Networked Robotics

1. Programming Environments
2. Prototyping for RA
3. Rehabilitation Robotics
4. Robo-Ethics
5. Safety, Security, and Rescue
6. Semiconductor Factory Automation
7. Service Robots
8. Surgical Robotics
9. Underwater Robotics

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• Aerial Robotics and Unmanned Aerial Vehicles
• Flying opens new opportunities to robotically
  perform field services and tasks like search and
  rescue, observation and mapping. Key areas to be
  addressed include autonomous missions,
  localization and multi-vehicle coordination.
• Activities
• IEEE Robotics and Automation Magazine Special
  Issue "Unmanned Aerial Vehicles Enabling
  Technologies and Roadmap for Autonomy", Guest
  Editors K.P. Valavanis (USF) and G.J.
  Vachtsevanos (Georgia Tech)
• Springer-Verlag Book on UAVs (to be published)
• 2006 2nd Annual Indoor Aerial Robot Competition,
  May 7, 2006 - Philadelphia
• ICRA 2006
• Full day workshop, UAVs Missions and Payloads
• Full day tutorial, Hands-on Lessons for UAV
  Construction
• To Join, Contact Paul Oh paul_at_coe.drexel.edu

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IEEE Robotics Automation SocietyAgricultural
Robotics Technical Committee
Australia and the National Centre for Engineering
in Agriculture develop Vision/GPS/Inertial
guidance systems for farm machinery
University of Southern Queensland researchers and
the National Centre for Engineering in
Agriculture develop image processing systems for
livestock recognition
University of Georgia researchers develop
networked autonomous GPS guided farm vehicles
To Join Jason Stone stonej_at_usq.edu.au
John Billingsley billings_at_usq.edu.au
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Bio Robotics The main focus of Biorobotics is to
learn from biological systems via a
biomechatronic point of view, trying to
understand the scientific and engineering
principles underlying their extraordinary
performance. design and fabrication of novel,
high performance bio-inspired machines and
systems, for many different potential
applications and to develop (nano, micro, macro)
novel devices that can better act on, substitute
parts of, and assist human beings, such as in
diagnosis, surgery, prosthetics, rehabilitation
and personal assistance. Haptics Symposium 2006
Workshop March 25, 2006 - Arlington VA
(Washington DC) USA Biorob2006 was the
first International Biorobotics conference,
co-sponsored by IEEE RAS and IEEE EMBS and held
in February 2006 in Pisa Italy. To
Join Hannaford, Blake (blake_at_ee.washington
edu) Takanishi, Atsuo (takanisi_at_waseda.jp)

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Computer and Robot VisionChairs Nikos
Papanikolopoulos (UMn) and Kostas Daniilidis
(UPenn)
.
.
Camera Networks Computer Vision in
Industry Vision for Localization
Human Activity Monitoring
.
.
Cognex Inc.
SIFT features by D. Lowe
To Join npapas_at_cs.umn.edu
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Human-Robot Interaction and Coordination
Co-Chairs Cecilia Laschi , Cynthia Breazeal,
Yasushi Nakauchi

• Recent Technical Developments
• Computational models of core human
  socio-cognitive skills (such as perspective
  taking and shared attention) have been
  successfully demonstrated to improve the quality
  of human-robot teamwork and interaction
• HRI frameworks have successfully been applied to
  traditional machine learning methods to enable
  humanoid and mobile robots to learn from natural
  human interactions via imitation, demonstration,
  and tutelage.
• The HRI community has embarked on developing
  evaluation metrics that embrace
  multi-disciplinary perspectives such as human
  factors, psychology, robotics, etc. for diverse
  areas of HRI such as Urban Search and Rescue,
  Social Robotics, H-R teams for Space Exploration,
  and more.
• To Join tchric-all_at_hri.iit.tsukuba.ac.jp

Leonardo sharing attention during collaborative
tasks at MIT Media Lab
DB learning by demonstration to play air-hockey
at ATR
Robonaut (teleop)-astronaut teams at NASA JSC
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• Humanoid Robotics
• IEEE-RAS International Conference on Humanoid
  Robots 2005 Event - conference December 5,
  2005 - Tsukuba, Japan
• The conference theme was "Humanoid Robots that
  Interact with Humans and the Society," reflecting
  growing interests in personal service and
  entertainment robots that can interact with
  humans. The conference was part of a series
  started in Boston in 2000, and traveled through
  Tokyo (2001), Karlsruhe/Munich (2003), and Santa
  Monica (2004), and brought the spirit to Tsukuba.
  The 2005 World Exposition, Aichi, Japan had taken
  place from March 25 to September 25, 2005 with a
  theme on "nature's wisdom" for rediscovering the
  relationship between humanity and technology, and
  featuring the robotic exposition. Topics of
  interest include, but are not limited to,
  anthropomorphism in robotics (hardware/software/th
  eory), Robotics for human science
  (behavioral/psychological/cognitive/neural
  science), Human science for robotics, Human-robot
  interaction, Humanoid robot applications,
  Key-components for humanoid robots.
• To Join
• Sugano, Shigeki (sugano_at_waseda.jp)
• Hirukawa, Hirohisa (hiro. Hirukawa_at_aist.go.jp)
• Lee, C. S. George (csglee_at_purdue.edu)

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Christian Laugier Urbano Nunes Alberto Broggi

• The DARPA Grand Challenge
• The first race ever that saw 5 autonomous
  vehicles reach the finish line after 130 miles
  of desert, rough terrain, and extreme
  conditions.
• The first time that unmanned vehicles succeed
  in this extremely complex task.

Cybercars a new approach for sustainable
mobility Emerging as an alternative to the
private passenger car, cybercars try to
offer the same flexibility and much less
nuisances based on fully automated electrical
vehicles with on-demand and door-to-door
capability. Fleets of such vehicles are being
deployed in several worldwide cities and are
already operational in specific environments
such as shuttle services for
passenger transportation.
Steering Control Combination of Adaptive Cruise
Control (ACC) and Lane Keep Assist System
(LKAS).
Join Urbano Nunes, urbano_at_isr.uc.pt
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Manufacturing Automation

• "Steady-State Throughput and Scheduling Analysis
  of Multi-Cluster Tools for Semiconductor
  Manufacturing"Jingang Yi, (Lam Research
  Corporation), Shengwei Ding, (University
  ofCalifornia at Berkeley) and Dezhen Song, (Texas
  AM University, USA)
• "Geometric Computation for Assembly Planning with
  Planar Toleranced Parts"Yaron Ostrovsky-Berman
  and Leo Joskowicz (The Hebrew University of
  Jerusalem, Israel)
• "Analysis of Andon Type Transfer Production
  Lines A Quantitative Approach"Jingshan Li and
  Dennis E. Blumenfeld (General Motors Research
  Development Center, USA)

• Co-Chairs
• Michael Yu Wang Chinese University of Hong Kong
• Zexiang Li Hong Kong University of Science
  Technology 
• Kin Huat LowNanyang Technological University,
  Singapore

• To join
• Kin Huat Lowmkhlow_at_ntu.edu.sg

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Micro/Nano Robotics and Automation Technical
Committee
Co-Chairs Fumihito Arai and Ari Requicha arai _at_
imech.mech.tohoku.ac.jp requicha _at_ usc.edu
Recent Advances
Electron micrograph of a MEMS microrobot that can
be controlled electrostatically in the plane.
Reference B. Donald, C. Levey, C. McGray, I.
Paprotny and D. Rus, An untethered,
electrostatic, globally controllable MEMS
micro-robot, J. Microelectromechanical Systems,
Vol. 15, No. 1, pp. 1-15, February 2006.
A self-assembly technique for building arbitrary
shapes at the nanoscale by folding long,
single-stranded DNA. Reference P. W. K.
Rothemund, Folding DNA to create nanoscale
shapes and patterns, Nature, Vol. 440, pp.
297-302, 16 March 2006.
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Networked Robots A "networked robot" is a
robotic device connected to a communications
network such as the Internet or LAN. The network
could be wired or wireless, and based on any of
of a variety of protocols such as TCP, UDP, or
802.11. Many new applications are now being
developed ranging from automation to exploration.
There are two subclasses of Networked Robots 1)
Tele-operated, where human supervisors send
commands and receive feedback via the network.
Such systems support research, education, and
public awareness by making valuable resources
accessible to broad audiences. 2) Autonomous,
where robots and sensors exchange data via the
network. In such systems, the sensor network
extends the effective sensing range of the
robots, allowing them to communicate with each
other over long distances to coordinate their
activity. Networked robots pose a number of
technical challenges related to network noise,
reliability, congestion, fixed and variable time
delay, stability, passivity, range and power
limitations, deployment, coverage, safety,
localization, sensor and actuation fusion, and
user interface design. New capabilities arise
frequently with the introduction of new hardware,
software, and protocol standards. Wolfram
Burgard, Nak-Young Chong, and Gaurav
Sukhatme Founding Co-Chairs Ken Goldberg and
Roland Siegwart
To Join burgard_at_informatik.uni-freiburg.de
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Programming Environments in Robotics
AutomationAdvances in Robot Software Development

• Domain Analysis identification of issues and
  challenges in robot software development
• Hardware heterogeneity
• Prototype/Simulation/Reality
• Component-based Development definition of
  reusable software component models
• Component internal behavior
• Component external interface
• Component integration
• Framework-based Development definition of
  software architectures for robot control
  application
• Middleware for distribution
• Functionality customization

To Join Brugali, Davide Brugali.unibg.it
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Prototyping for Robotics Automation

• TC Chairs
• I-Ming Chen (Nanyang Technological University
• Metin Sitti (Carnegie Mellon University)
• Recent Technical Developments
• Spherical Actuators (3-DOF ball-joint like
  direct-drive actuator)
• Micro- Nano manipulation components
  (Flexure-based Electromagnetic Linear Actuator
  for high precision force control and positioning)
• Reconfigurable Automation (Reconfigurable and
  modular robotics)
• To Join I-Ming Chen (michen_at_ntu.edu.sg)

Spherical actuator
Reconf. automation
Flexure linear actuator
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Rehabilitation Robotics
Michelle J. Johnson
Eugenio Guglielmelli
Takahori Shibata Marquette University, USA
Università
Campus Bio-Medico, Italy
AIST, Japan (From RAS Area
1 Americas) (From RAS
Area 2 Europe, Middle Est Africa)
(From RAS Area 3 Asia Oceania)
RECENT ACHIEVEMENTS
THE WL-16 LEGGED CHAIR FOR MOBILITY OF THE
ELDERLY AND THE DISABLED
ROBOT-THERAPIST CO-OPERATION FOR LOWER LIMB
MOTOR THERAPY
A NEW SIMPLE SYSTEM FOR ROBOT-MEDIATED UPPER LIMB
MOTOR THERAPY

• This robot consists of two Stewart Platform type
  legs and waist with a passenger seat
• Developed by Waseda University (Tokyo) in
  co-operation with the TMSUK company
• Preliminary tests confirmed the stability and
  effectiveness of the system carrying one 60 Kg
  passenger

• MEMOS is a novel low-cost, 2 d.o.f. mechatronic
  system for elbow-shoulder rehabilitation
• Developed by the ARTS Lab of the Scuola Superiore
  SantAnna (Pisa) and experimented at Fondazione
  S. Maugeri (Veruno), Italy
• Preliminary clinical trials on post-stroke
  patients show very encouraging results

• The KineAssist is a robotic device for gait and
  balance motor training
• It results from a partnership of the Rehab
  Institute of Chicago with the IDEO company
• Key novel feature is therapist-robot physical
  interaction and co-operation for assisting the
  patient exercise

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Roboethics

• Co-chairs
• Gianmarco Veruggio ltgianmarco_at_veruggio.itgt
  (corresponding chair)
• Ronald C. Arkin ltarkin_at_cc.gatech.edugt
• Atsuo Takanishi lttakanisi_at_waseda.jpgt

Roboethics Ethical aspects in the design,
development and employment of Intelligent
Machines. The TC was born in January 2004, at
the First International Symposium on Roboethics,
Villa Nobel, Sanremo, Italy.
Current Number of Members 42

• RECENT DEVELOPMENTS
• IEEE Workshop on Roboethics organized by the TC
  at ICRA2005, Barcelona.
• EURON Atelier on Roboethics, Genova, Italy,
  February 2006

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Safety Security and Rescue Robotics IEEE
International Workshop on Safety, Securitiy and
Rescue Robotics (SSRR 2006) Workshop August
25, 2006 - NIST, Gaithersburg, MD, USA
Contact Information Adam Jacoff (adam dot jacoff
at nist dot gov) IEEE International
Workshop on Safety, Security and Rescue Robotics
(SSRR 2005) Workshop June 9, 2005 - Kobe,
Japan o Nardi, Daniele
(nardi_at_dis.uniroma1.it) Univ.
Roma "La Sapienza", Dip. Informatica e
Sistemistica o Voyles, Richard
(voyles.cs.umn.edu) University
of Minnesota o Matsuno, Fumitoshi
(matsuno.hi.mce.uec. Ac.jp) The
University of Electro-Communications
corresponding chair - send email to join
committee Committee Chairs Emeritus
o Tadokoro, Satoshi (tadokoro.rm.is.tohoku.ac.
jp) Tohoku University To Join
Satoshi Tadokoro (tadokoro_at_rm.is.tohoku.ac.jp)
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Semiconductor Factory Automation To Join
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• Service Robotics
• Robot systems providing services of various kinds
  to human users. Above all, the Service Robots
  Technical Committee understands itself as a forum
  for exchange of information related to the design
  and development of service robots.
• To Join Hadi Moradi moradi_at_usc.edu
• Emeriti Co-Chairs
• Fiorini, Paolo
• Erwin Prassler

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IEEE Robotics and Automation's Technical
Committee onSurgical Robotics
Automatic Detection of Instruments in
Laparoscopic Images
Some examples of recent applications
MRI-Compatible Robotics
Credit (Voros, et. al., TIMC)
Locomoting Devices
Credit S. DiMaio et al., BioRob 2006
TC Co-Chairs Jaydev P. Desai, desai_at_coe.drexel.ed
u Frank Tendick, frank.tendick_at_ucsf.edu Mamoru
Mitsuishi, mamoru_at_nml.t.u-tokyo.ac.jp

• To join, please contact Corresponding Chair
• Jaydev P. Desai - desai_at_coe.drexel.edu

Credit Metin Sitti, CMU
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Underwater Robotics Co-Chairs J. Yuh and Dan
Stilwell
To Join stilwell.vt.edu
The Japan Agency for Marine-Earth Science and
Technology (JAMSTEC) has developed a deep-sea
vehicle, URASHIMA for ocean science and
exploration of ocean resources. This vehicle is
one of the first underwater vehicles powered by
fuel cell technology. http//www.jamstec.go.jp/
The Autonomous System Laboratory (ASL) of the
University of Hawaii, MASE, Inc, and The Naval
Undersea Warfare Center (NUWC) have developed the
SAUVIM AUV for intervention missions in up to
6,000m depth and demonstrated its autonomous
robotic arm operation in 2005. http//www.eng.hawa
ii.edu/asl/
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Most Active TC Award Intelligent Transport
Systems (Alberto Broggi Christian Laugier,
Urbano Nunes)
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• Young Professionals Lunch
• Thursday, 1220-120pm
• International Ballroom North

Technical Activities Board
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• TAB Report to Adcomm, 20 May 2006
• Introduction, TC chairs, DLs
• Selected RAS Technical Milestones
• Review of new TAB website and database
• Review of TCs
• TAB meeting, Young Professionals Lunch
• Most Active TC Award Intelligent Transport
  Systems
• (Alberto Broggi, Christian Laugier, Urbano Nunes)
  
• Proposal Establish 2 New TCs
• Algorithms for Planning and Control of Robot
  Motion
• Space Robotics
• Proposal Expanding DL program from 15 to 24 DLS
• Proposal Most Active DL Award (1000/year)
• Proposal Expand Young Professionals Lunch to
  IROS (5000/year)
• Proposal Approve TAB Charter

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Motion to Change Name of RAS Technical Committee
on Micro/Nano Robots To Micro/Nano Robotics
and Automation
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Motion to Establish an RAS Technical Committee
on Space Robotics The space environment
(micro-gravity, thermal extremes,
contamination sensitivity, thermal extremes,
etc.) poses unique challenges to robotics  and
robot algorithms. The space (non-planetary)
robotics discipline will find increasing
importance in coming years, particularly as the 
opportunities for human-robot and
robot-robot cooperation arise in space
exploration. Rick Wagner, Northrop Grumman Space
Technology, Rick.Wagner_at_NGC.com Dimi
Apostolopoulos, Carnegie-Mellon University,
da1v_at_cs.cmu.edu Hobson Lane, Northrop Grumman
Space Technology, Hobson.Lane_at_NGC.com
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Motion to Establish an RAS Technical Committee
on Algorithms for Planning and Control of Robot
Motion As modern robots address real-world
problems in dynamic, unstructured, and open
environments, novel challenges arise in the areas
of robot control algorithms and motion planning.
These challenges stem from an increased need for
autonomy and flexibility in robot motion and
task execution. Adequate algorithms for control
and motion planning will have to capture
high-level motion strategies that adapt to
sensor feedback. The technical committee for
Algorithms for Planning and Control of Robot
Motion promotes algorithms research, both basic
and application-driven, towards these objectives.
Oliver Brock, University of Massachusetts
Amherst, oli_at_cs.umass.edu Steve LaValle,
University of Illinois, lavalle_at_cs.uiuc.edu Thierr
y Simeon, LAAS, nic_at_laas.fr Tsutomu Hasegawa,
Kyushu U. hasegawa_at_hasegawa.is.kyushu-u.ac.jp
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Motion to Expand the RAS Distinguished Lecturer
Program from 15 to 24 members We are working to
create more impact from the RAS
Distinguished Lecturer Program, which promotes
the field of Robotics and Automation to the broad
engineering community and to the public at large.
The Program has a budget of 10,000/year to
support air transport when DLs arrange speaking
engagements with local IEEE Chapters. Beginning
in 2006, Distinguished Lecturers are also
encouraged to arrange and present "Public
Lectures" Public Lectures are aimed
at non-specialists, and can be given in
high-schools, senior citizens homes, science
fairs, science museums, and the like. Proposal
Expand the number of DLs from 5 per region to 8
per region. Rationale To represent more
countries within each region. We would like to
appoint DLs in currently under-represented
countries that can serve to inspire and
advance Robotics and Automation within these
countries. To thereby reduce transport costs
for talks at IEEE Chapters. This proposal will
not affect the 10,000 DL budget.
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Motion to Approve Most Active DL
Award 1000/year. A new award modeled after the
Most Active TC Award, awarded annually as
incentive and acknowledgement of most active
DL. Financial Impact additional 1K per year
43
Motion to Approve Expanding Young
Professionals Lunch Currently 5000/year for
approximately 150 lunches for young professionals
at ICRA, motion to expand to 10,000/year
maintaining the ICRA YP Lunch and establishing a
YP Lunch at IROS (subject to IROS
approval). Financial Impact Additional 5K per
year
44
Motion to Approve TAB Charter Charter
summarizes the roles, objectives, duties, and
procedures of the RAS Technical Activities Board,
including its officers, Technical Committees, and
Distinguished Lecturers.
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Motion to Approve TAB Charter summarizes
the roles, objectives, duties, and procedures of
the RAS Technical Activities Board, including its
officers, Technical Committees, and Distinguished
Lecturers.
46
Motion to Approve TAB Charter summarizes
the roles, objectives, duties, and procedures of
the RAS Technical Activities Board, including its
officers, Technical Committees, and Distinguished
Lecturers.
47

• Duties of the VPTA
•  
• The Vice President of Technical Activities (VPTA)
  is elected by the Adcomm and serves a 2 year
  term.
•  
• Encourage RAS Research and Technical Activity
• Organize and Chair semi-annual TAB meetings
• Coordinate TC Activity
• Administer DL Program (and funding requests)
• Organize the annual Young Professionals Lunch at
  ICRA
• Serve as a reliable point of contact for the TAB
• Attend Excomm and Adcomm meetings
• Administer budget for TC promotion and website
  improvement
• Administer budget DL budget (check the amount)
• Administer Annual Most Active TC Award
• Administer Annual Most Active DL Award
  provisional
• Coordinate and promtly submit semi-annual reports
  to the Adcomm
• Maintain the TAB website
• Communicate at least twice a year with TC Chairs
• Promptly respond to inquiries from fellow
  researchers and the press

48

• TAB Report to Adcomm, 20 May 2006
• Introduction, TC chairs, DLs
• Selected RAS Technical Milestones
• Review of new TAB website and database
• Review of TCs
• TAB meeting, Young Professionals Lunch
• Most Active TC Award Intelligent Transport
  Systems
• (Alberto Broggi, Christian Laugier, Urbano Nunes)
  
• Proposal Establish 2 New TCs
• Algorithms for Planning and Control of Robot
  Motion
• Space Robotics
• Proposal Expanding DL program from 15 to 24 DLS
• Proposal Most Active DL Award (1000/year)
• Proposal Expand Young Professionals Lunch to
  IROS (5000/year)
• Proposal Approve TAB Charter
• (All Proposals Unanimously approved by TAB and
  Adcomm!)