On 8th September, as part of TAROS 2015, Professor Tony Belpaeme of Plymouth University gave the IET Public Lecture.



Professor Belpaeme delivered a fantastic presentation on the friendly face of robots and he shared with the audience an insight into research that is working towards robots that are social and can provide support in healthcare, therapeutic settings and education.  Included were examples of friendly robots that have helped children with diabetes learn more about their condition and how to cope with it and a case where Riccardo the robot helped a young child who had suffered a stroke with his physiotherapy.  All very fascinating and thought provoking.



There's a great article online that reports on the sucess of robots and computers in schools and care home environments.



Part of the presentation included a compilation video of robots falling down at the DARPA Robotics Challenge event 2015  which caused much amusement in the audience.



The presentation was filmed by IET.tv and you can view here.   You can also view the presentation slides in our files section 



As part of the TAROS 2015 Conference, the Robotics & Mechatronics TPN sponsored one of the prizes on the final day.  



The winning paper was Robot Mapping and Localisation for Feature Sparse Water Pipes using Voids as Landmarks and the prize certificate was collected on behalf of the team by Ke Ma, from Sheffield University,  and below he tells us a little more about himself and what winning the prize has meant to him.  Ke was presented with his certificate by Mark Witkowski from our exec team, and will receive £150 cash prize.



Ke says:



"I am a PhD student in the Department of Automatic Control and Systems Engineering, University of Sheffield, UK. I am conducting a PhD research into Robot Navigation in Water Distribution Pipes, which is a part of Assessing the Underworld (ATU) research programme largely funded by EPSRC. It was my first time attending an academic conference – TAROS 2015 in Liverpool. I am very grateful for this award. The approval from IET was significant to our team’s previous hard work and also a great encouragement for my future research in the Robotics field".