RSS 2015 Workshop

Bridging the Gap between Data-driven and Analytical Physics-based Grasping and Manipulation

Abstract

In the last two decades, probabilistic data-driven approaches to manipulation have celebrated extensive successes due to their ability to extract complex behaviors from collected data. Generative probabilistic approaches furthermore have the advantage that they can synthesize grasps based on previously seen data. However these approaches can only be verified empirically and do not necessarily abide by physical and dynamical constraints which can be modeled manually in an analytical approach. At the same time, these classical physics-based approaches to manipulation have advanced, and have started to incorporate a notion of uncertainty in their analysis. However simplifying assumptions e.g. on the contact and friction model, often have to be made. The combination of physics-based constraints with probabilistic reasoning however remains one of the key challenges in this field. This workshop focuses on bridging this gap, as well as on discussing the respective benefits of analytical and probabilistic approaches in various application domains.

Topics

The workshop will focus on the following areas, including but not limited to:

Schedule

08:40 - 08:50 Welcome
08:50 - 09:20 Invited Talk: Prof. Antonio Bicchi, University of Pisa.
09:20 - 09:50 Invited Talk: Prof. Jonas Buchli, ETH.
09:50 - 10:15 Poster Highlighters: 8 posters; 3 minute presentations
10:15 - 10:45 Coffee Break and Poster Session
10:45 - 11:15 Invited Talk: Prof. Siddhartha Srinivasa, CMU.
11:15 - 11:35 Talk: Paper
11:35 - 11:55 Talk: Paper
11:55 - 13:30 Lunch Break
13:30 - 14:00 Invited Talk: Prof. Danica Kragic, KTH.
14:00 - 14:30 Invited Talk: Prof. Jan Peters, TU Darmstadt.
14:30 - 15:00 Invited Talk: Dr. Jeannette Bohg , Max Planck Institute for Intelligent Systems.
15:00 - 15:30 Invited Talk: Prof. Robert Platt, Northeastern University.
15:30 - 16:00 Coffee Break and Poster Session
16:00 - 16:30 Invited Talk: Prof. Ken Goldberg, UC Berkeley.
16:30 - 17:00 Invited Talk: Prof. Jeff Trinkle, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute.
17:00 - 18:00 Panel Discussion

Workshop Agenda

The aim is to bring together researchers with different approaches to grasping and manipulation, both from the classical analytical/physics modeling based background and from the purely data-driven direction. The proposed speakers have been selected to cover a wide range of probabilistic and analytical grasp synthesis methods and to include experts in robotics, machine learning, and control. Invited speakers will get a 30 minute slot to present their latest work relevant to the workshop theme, also including the limits and opportunities that they see with these approaches and how they can be combined and feature in their own work. We will organize an interactive poster session, allowing more contributors to present their work and have detailed discussions with the workshop attendees. Contributed papers will be published on the website and invited to present a poster. We will have a panel discussion at the end where participants can discuss open questions on the state of the art in grasp and manipulation planning and the proposed directions of new research efforts that will be raised during the talks by the speakers. We hope to include many contributors and have fruitful discussions between invited speakers, active contributors, and the audience.

Call for Papers

We welcome the submission of two page extended abstracts describing new or ongoing work. The best two submissions will be selected for oral presentations during the workshop. Final instructions for poster presentations and talks will be available on the workshop website after decision notifications have been made. Accepted presenters will have the option of submitting a full length six-page paper. All contributed papers will be accessible on the workshop website. Submissions should be in .pdf format using the RSS paper template (LaTeX template, Word template ). Please send submissions to Florian T. Pokorny (fpokorny [at] csc.kth.se) and Yasemin Bekiroglu (yaseminb [at] csc.kth.se) with the subject line "RSS 2015 Workshop Submission”. For any questions or clarifications, please contact the organizers.

Important Dates:

Abstract submission deadline: June 8, 2015

Acceptance notification: June 19, 2015

Final materials due: July 3, 2015

Workshop date: July 16, 2015

Organizers

Florian T. Pokorny (KTH, UC Berkeley), fpokorny [at] csc.kth.se
Yu Sun (USF), yusun [at] cse.usf.edu
Carl Henrik Ek (KTH), chek [at] csc.kth.se
Yasemin Bekiroglu (KTH), yaseminb [at] csc.kth.se (contact person)