- Happy Mental Health Awareness Month. Now is as good a time as any to remind ourselves about the state of the mental health crisis in higher education and what we can do about it. In particular, it’s important to recognize that we were living through a crisis before the pandemic, and the fear, isolation, insecurity, lost opportunities, and despair that followed have inflamed illnesses and made already-desparate situations unbearable for many.
- Why can animals outrun robots? It is obvious that animals outperform robots at running – really, any legged locomotion task involving significant momentum. But what causes this performance gap? Could it be better actuators? sensors? “compute”-ors? The answer to this question is important for determining the most fruitful lines of research for roboticists interested in closing the performance gap. This observation motivated my co-authors and I to write a review paper that definitively answers the question.
- How to add Fellows to your conference Momona Yamagami and I added a Fellows program to the 2022 IFAC Workshop on Cyber-Physical-Human Systems (CPHS). In addition to raising funds from NSF, we invested substantial effort in thinking through each element of a Fellows program. Looking back, we are proud of the work we did and the impact it had on the 13 early-career researchers we supported, so we want to share materials that may be useful to others seeking to do similar work.
- My illness I’ve been thinking about writing this post for a very long time. I want to share my experience with chronic illness.
- Three (!) papers on co-adaptation I am very excited to highlight three recent archival papers from my group on the theme of co-adaptation between human and machine learners.
- Promoted & Tenured (& Sabbatical'd) I received notice from my University’s Academic HR that my promotion to Associate Professor with Tenure has been approved, effective September 16 2022. I also received notice from my College’s HR that my request for sabbatical leave for the 9 months of the 2022–2023 academic year was approved.
- Applying to Faculty Positions I was recently hired in a tenure-track faculty position at an RU/VH university. The application, interview, negotiation, and decision processes were each incredibly difficult. I am very grateful for the extraordinary mentoring and assistance I received, and feel extremely fortunate for the outcome. This post, analogous to my Applying to Grad School brain dump, catalogues my experiences and summarizes my advice.
- Applying to Graduate Programs After an extensive application/visit/decision process, I cataloged some of the information I gathered about the graduate school application process. Toward the end of grad school, I took another look at this document. Overall the advice seems sound in hindsight, but I’ve inserted some important edits and revisions. I’m guessing there will be something here for everyone applying to PhD programs in engineering, and for those considering other types of programs (master’s, or degrees in the physical sciences or humanities) to a lesser extent.
all posts
academia
- Happy Mental Health Awareness Month. Now is as good a time as any to remind ourselves about the state of the mental health crisis in higher education and what we can do about it. In particular, it’s important to recognize that we were living through a crisis before the pandemic, and the fear, isolation, insecurity, lost opportunities, and despair that followed have inflamed illnesses and made already-desparate situations unbearable for many.
- How to add Fellows to your conference Momona Yamagami and I added a Fellows program to the 2022 IFAC Workshop on Cyber-Physical-Human Systems (CPHS). In addition to raising funds from NSF, we invested substantial effort in thinking through each element of a Fellows program. Looking back, we are proud of the work we did and the impact it had on the 13 early-career researchers we supported, so we want to share materials that may be useful to others seeking to do similar work.
- Promoted & Tenured (& Sabbatical'd) I received notice from my University’s Academic HR that my promotion to Associate Professor with Tenure has been approved, effective September 16 2022. I also received notice from my College’s HR that my request for sabbatical leave for the 9 months of the 2022–2023 academic year was approved.
- Up for Promotion & Tenure This is my mandatory year for promotion and tenure evaluation. I am proud of the work I have accomplished with my students and collaborators on the tenure track, and I am excited for what the future holds.
- Applying to Faculty Positions I was recently hired in a tenure-track faculty position at an RU/VH university. The application, interview, negotiation, and decision processes were each incredibly difficult. I am very grateful for the extraordinary mentoring and assistance I received, and feel extremely fortunate for the outcome. This post, analogous to my Applying to Grad School brain dump, catalogues my experiences and summarizes my advice.
- Applying to Graduate Programs After an extensive application/visit/decision process, I cataloged some of the information I gathered about the graduate school application process. Toward the end of grad school, I took another look at this document. Overall the advice seems sound in hindsight, but I’ve inserted some important edits and revisions. I’m guessing there will be something here for everyone applying to PhD programs in engineering, and for those considering other types of programs (master’s, or degrees in the physical sciences or humanities) to a lesser extent.
amp
awards
- College of Engineering Awards PhD student Momona Yamagami receives the Student Research Award from the College of Engineering, and Professor Sam Burden receives the Junior Faculty award.
- NSF CAREER Award My NSF CAREER proposal was funded through the Mind, Machine, Motor Nexus (M3X) Program!
- Momona wins Best Paper Award from CNT PhD student Momona Yamagami receives the Fernando Family Fund Best Student Paper Award from the Center for Neurotechnology for her paper on Decoding intent with control theory: Comparing muscle versus manual interface performance, which appeared at the prestigious ACM CHI conference in 2020.
- ARO YIP grant My second grant, an ARO YIP, was awarded through the Mechanical Sciences Division under PM Samuel Stanton’s Complex Dynamics and Systems program!
conferences
- Sensorimotor Games at Dynamic Walking I presented at the 2022 Dynamic Walking meeting in Madison, WI on human/machine interaction is a sensorimotor game – you can watch the video here.
- Plenary at Conference on Motor Learning and Motor Control I gave a plenary talk at MLMC 2021 – the Conference on Motor Learning and Motor Control.
- Presentation at IROS Workshop on Impact-Aware Robotics I presented in a workshop on Impact-Aware Robotics organized by Yan Gu, Alessandro Saccon, and Abderrahmane Kheddar at IROS 2021.
- IROS 2019 in Macau Joey travels to Macau for the 2019 International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS).
- Greetings from the beach! As the absent co-organizer of last year’s meeting, it was a pleasure to attend Dynamic Walking (DW) this year – doubly so since it was at such an outrageously beautiful location!
- Papers at ICRA, HSCC, SPIE Andrew Pace will present our papers on different ways to differentiate contact-rich dynamics at HSCC in Pittsburgh, PA and ICRA in Singapore; in the meantime, you can read pre-prints of the ICRA paper and the HSCC paper.
- Greetings from summer camp! It’s no secret that Dynamic Walking (DW) is my favorite academic meeting. It’s everything that the massive, 20+ parallel-track conferences I frequent (which I won’t name, but will link to) aren’t. Faculty mix with students, everyone attends the talks, there are lively group discussions, and, amazingly, tons of time for socializing and recreating.
- Three (!) workshops in January January was the month for workshops.
defenses
- Maneeshika defends her PhD PhD student #5, Maneeshika Madduri, has successfully defended her PhD thesis on “Modeling and Shaping Human-Machine Interactions in Closed-loop, Co-adaptive Neural Interfaces”. Maneeshika was co-advised by myself and Amy Orsborn.
- Ben defends his PhD PhD student #4, Ben Chasnov, has successfully defended his PhD thesis on “Dynamics of Multi-Agent Learning Under Bounded Rationality: Theory and Empirical Evidence”. Ben was co-advised by myself and Lillian Ratliff.
- Momona defends her PhD PhD student #3, Momona Yamagami, has successfully defended her PhD thesis on “Modeling and Enhancing Human-Machine Interaction for Accessibility and Health”. Momona was co-advised by myself and Kat Steele.
- Andrew defends his PhD PhD student #2, Andrew Pace, successfully defended his PhD thesis on “Stepping Towards Control of Systems Undergoing Impact for Legged Locomotion”.
- Bora defends his PhD PhD student #1, Bora Banjanin, successfully defended his PhD thesis on Data-driven modeling for hybrid dynamical systems.
farewell
fellowships
grants
- UW+Amazon Science Hub gift Lillian Ratliff and I received a gift from the UW+Amazon Science Hub to do research on the topic “Hierarchical framework for scalable multi-agent autonomous mobility”.
- BMI grants from NSF and WANPRC Amy Orsborn and I received two grants to study sensorimotor control in Brain/Machine Interfaces (BMI)!
- NSF CAREER Award My NSF CAREER proposal was funded through the Mind, Machine, Motor Nexus (M3X) Program!
- NSF NRI grant Tom Libby and I have just received a new award from the NSF National Robotics Initiative (NRI) program for our proposal on design of dynamic multibehavioral robots.
- NSF CPS grant Lillian Ratliff and I have just received a new award from the NSF Cyber-Physical Systems (CPS) program for our proposal on certifiable reinforcement learning for CPS.
- S-STEM Grant I am thrilled to join the team, led by UW CoE Assoc Dean / EE Prof Eve Riskin, that just received an NSF S-STEM grant to expand innovative “academic redshirts” programs!
- ARO YIP grant My second grant, an ARO YIP, was awarded through the Mechanical Sciences Division under PM Samuel Stanton’s Complex Dynamics and Systems program!
- NSF CPS CRII grant My first grant, an NSF CRII, was awarded through the Cyber-Physical Systems (CPS) program under PM David Corman!
news
- Maneeshika defends her PhD PhD student #5, Maneeshika Madduri, has successfully defended her PhD thesis on “Modeling and Shaping Human-Machine Interactions in Closed-loop, Co-adaptive Neural Interfaces”. Maneeshika was co-advised by myself and Amy Orsborn.
- Why can animals outrun robots? It is obvious that animals outperform robots at running – really, any legged locomotion task involving significant momentum. But what causes this performance gap? Could it be better actuators? sensors? “compute”-ors? The answer to this question is important for determining the most fruitful lines of research for roboticists interested in closing the performance gap. This observation motivated my co-authors and I to write a review paper that definitively answers the question.
- How to add Fellows to your conference Momona Yamagami and I added a Fellows program to the 2022 IFAC Workshop on Cyber-Physical-Human Systems (CPHS). In addition to raising funds from NSF, we invested substantial effort in thinking through each element of a Fellows program. Looking back, we are proud of the work we did and the impact it had on the 13 early-career researchers we supported, so we want to share materials that may be useful to others seeking to do similar work.
- Three (!) papers on co-adaptation I am very excited to highlight three recent archival papers from my group on the theme of co-adaptation between human and machine learners.
- UW+Amazon Science Hub gift Lillian Ratliff and I received a gift from the UW+Amazon Science Hub to do research on the topic “Hierarchical framework for scalable multi-agent autonomous mobility”.
- Ben defends his PhD PhD student #4, Ben Chasnov, has successfully defended his PhD thesis on “Dynamics of Multi-Agent Learning Under Bounded Rationality: Theory and Empirical Evidence”. Ben was co-advised by myself and Lillian Ratliff.
- Promoted & Tenured (& Sabbatical'd) I received notice from my University’s Academic HR that my promotion to Associate Professor with Tenure has been approved, effective September 16 2022. I also received notice from my College’s HR that my request for sabbatical leave for the 9 months of the 2022–2023 academic year was approved.
- Welcome Jason & Ember Welcome to Jason Isa and Ember Chow, who are joining the group as PhD students.
- Momona hired as an Assistant Professor in ECE at Rice I am over the moon to share the news that Momona Yamagami, whose PhD was co-advised by myself and Kat Steele, was hired as a tenure-track Assistant Professor in Electrical and Computer Engineering at Rice University in Houston, TX, USA!!
- Sensorimotor Games at Dynamic Walking I presented at the 2022 Dynamic Walking meeting in Madison, WI on human/machine interaction is a sensorimotor game – you can watch the video here.
- Ember receives NSF fellowship Ember Chow received the National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship starting in September 2022.Congratulations, Ember!
- Momona defends her PhD PhD student #3, Momona Yamagami, has successfully defended her PhD thesis on “Modeling and Enhancing Human-Machine Interaction for Accessibility and Health”. Momona was co-advised by myself and Kat Steele.
- BMI grants from NSF and WANPRC Amy Orsborn and I received two grants to study sensorimotor control in Brain/Machine Interfaces (BMI)!
- Plenary at Conference on Motor Learning and Motor Control I gave a plenary talk at MLMC 2021 – the Conference on Motor Learning and Motor Control.
- Presentation at IROS Workshop on Impact-Aware Robotics I presented in a workshop on Impact-Aware Robotics organized by Yan Gu, Alessandro Saccon, and Abderrahmane Kheddar at IROS 2021.
- Welcome Joshua Welcome to Joshua Vasquez, who is joining us as a co-advised student with Nadya Peek from UW’s Department of Human Centered Design and Engineering. Joshua will be working on design and control of multibehavioral robots.
- Up for Promotion & Tenure This is my mandatory year for promotion and tenure evaluation. I am proud of the work I have accomplished with my students and collaborators on the tenure track, and I am excited for what the future holds.
- College of Engineering Awards PhD student Momona Yamagami receives the Student Research Award from the College of Engineering, and Professor Sam Burden receives the Junior Faculty award.
- NSF CAREER Award My NSF CAREER proposal was funded through the Mind, Machine, Motor Nexus (M3X) Program!
- Momona wins Best Paper Award from CNT PhD student Momona Yamagami receives the Fernando Family Fund Best Student Paper Award from the Center for Neurotechnology for her paper on Decoding intent with control theory: Comparing muscle versus manual interface performance, which appeared at the prestigious ACM CHI conference in 2020.
- Momona receives Peden fellowship PhD student Momona Yamagami is the 2020-2021 recipient of the Irene Peden Fellowship from the Department of Electrical & Computer Engineering, named in honor of Professor Irene Carswell Peden.
- Andrew defends his PhD PhD student #2, Andrew Pace, successfully defended his PhD thesis on “Stepping Towards Control of Systems Undergoing Impact for Legged Locomotion”.
- ECE Colloquium series -- Toward Telelocomotion I am thrilled to be hosting my Department’s Colloquium series this quarter – we have a fantastic lineup!
- Welcome Amber Welcome to Amber Chou, who is joining us after completing her master’s degree in Biological Systems Engineering at UC Davis. Amber will be working on sensorimotor fusion and multibehavioral robots.
- Maneeshika receives NDSEG fellowship Maneeshika Madduri received the National Defense Science and Engineering Graduate Fellowship awarded by the Department of Defense starting in September 2020.Congratulations, Maneeshika!
- Welcome Maneeshika Welcome to Maneeshika Madduri, who is a new PhD student co-advised with Professor Amy Orsborn joining us after earning her undergraduate and masters degrees in Electrical Engineering at Stanford.
- IROS 2019 in Macau Joey travels to Macau for the 2019 International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS).
- NSF NRI grant Tom Libby and I have just received a new award from the NSF National Robotics Initiative (NRI) program for our proposal on design of dynamic multibehavioral robots.
- Bora defends his PhD PhD student #1, Bora Banjanin, successfully defended his PhD thesis on Data-driven modeling for hybrid dynamical systems.
- Farewell to Tom Postdoc Tom Libby has accepted a position with SRI International as a Senior Research Engineer with the Robotics Team.
- Welcome Joseph Welcome to Joseph Sullivan, who is joining us after completing his master’s degree in Electrical & Computer Engineering at UW. Joseph will be working on haptic mixed reality for legged robots.
- NSF CPS grant Lillian Ratliff and I have just received a new award from the NSF Cyber-Physical Systems (CPS) program for our proposal on certifiable reinforcement learning for CPS.
- Greetings from the beach! As the absent co-organizer of last year’s meeting, it was a pleasure to attend Dynamic Walking (DW) this year – doubly so since it was at such an outrageously beautiful location!
- AMP Open House The lab I share with folks from Electrical Engineering, Mechanical Engineering, and Rehabilitation Medicine officially opened!
- Papers at ICRA, HSCC, SPIE Andrew Pace will present our papers on different ways to differentiate contact-rich dynamics at HSCC in Pittsburgh, PA and ICRA in Singapore; in the meantime, you can read pre-prints of the ICRA paper and the HSCC paper.
- AMP Center launched I am thrilled to announce that we’ve officially launched our new Center for Amplifying Movement and Performance!
- S-STEM Grant I am thrilled to join the team, led by UW CoE Assoc Dean / EE Prof Eve Riskin, that just received an NSF S-STEM grant to expand innovative “academic redshirts” programs!
- Farewell to Ryan Postdoc Ryan Robinson has accepted a position with Spaceflight Industries — starting Sep 1 2016, he’ll be an Engineer with the Attitude Determination and Control Team.
- AMP Center SRI funded The UW CoE Strategic Research Initiative (SRI) proposal I wrote in collaboration with Kat Steele, Eric Rombokas, Chet Moritz, and Val Kelly was funded! This award will enable us to launch an interdisciplinary Center for Analysis of Motion and Performance in Humans and Machines (AMP Center) based out of our new motion analysis facility in Wallace Hall (photo above shows renovation progress as of July 26 2016).
- Greetings from summer camp! It’s no secret that Dynamic Walking (DW) is my favorite academic meeting. It’s everything that the massive, 20+ parallel-track conferences I frequent (which I won’t name, but will link to) aren’t. Faculty mix with students, everyone attends the talks, there are lively group discussions, and, amazingly, tons of time for socializing and recreating.
- ARO YIP grant My second grant, an ARO YIP, was awarded through the Mechanical Sciences Division under PM Samuel Stanton’s Complex Dynamics and Systems program!
- NSF CPS CRII grant My first grant, an NSF CRII, was awarded through the Cyber-Physical Systems (CPS) program under PM David Corman!
- Three (!) workshops in January January was the month for workshops.
papers
welcome
- Welcome Jason & Ember Welcome to Jason Isa and Ember Chow, who are joining the group as PhD students.
- Welcome Joshua Welcome to Joshua Vasquez, who is joining us as a co-advised student with Nadya Peek from UW’s Department of Human Centered Design and Engineering. Joshua will be working on design and control of multibehavioral robots.
- Welcome Amber Welcome to Amber Chou, who is joining us after completing her master’s degree in Biological Systems Engineering at UC Davis. Amber will be working on sensorimotor fusion and multibehavioral robots.
- Welcome Maneeshika Welcome to Maneeshika Madduri, who is a new PhD student co-advised with Professor Amy Orsborn joining us after earning her undergraduate and masters degrees in Electrical Engineering at Stanford.
- Welcome Joseph Welcome to Joseph Sullivan, who is joining us after completing his master’s degree in Electrical & Computer Engineering at UW. Joseph will be working on haptic mixed reality for legged robots.
