"Beyond the Label: Robots that Reason about Object Semantics"

Thursday 7th October @ 11AM PST

Zoom:  https://ucsd.zoom.us/j/94406976474

Speaker:  Professor Sonia Chernova

 

Seminar Abstract

Reliable operation in everyday human environments – homes, offices, and businesses – remains elusive for today’s robotic systems. A key challenge is diversity, as no two homes or businesses are exactly alike. However, despite the innumerable unique aspects of any home, there are many commonalities as well, particularly about how objects are placed and used. These commonalities can be captured in semantic representations, and then used to improve the autonomy of robotic systems by, for example, enabling robots to infer missing information in human instructions, efficiently search for objects, or manipulate objects more effectively. In this talk, I will discuss recent advances in semantic reasoning, particularly focusing on semantics of everyday objects, household environments, and the development of robotic systems that intelligently interact with their world.

Bio:

Sonia Chernova is an Associate Professor in the College of Computing at Georgia Tech. She directs the Robot Autonomy and Interactive Learning lab, where her research focuses on the development of intelligent and interactive autonomous systems. Chernova’s contributions span robotics and artificial intelligence, including semantic reasoning, adaptive autonomy, human-robot interaction, and explainable AI. She has authored over 100 scientific papers and is the recipient of the NSF CAREER, ONR Young Investigator, and NASA Early Career Faculty awards. She also leads the NSF AI Institute for Collaborative Assistance and Responsive Interaction for Networked Groups (AI-CARING).