Ameca, one of the world’s most advanced humanoids, will take to the stage for a one-on-one interview with nationally decorated author Jeanette Winterson, as part of the Edinburgh Futures Institute (EFI) official launch event.
The robot, recently installed at The National Robotarium, a world-leading centre for robotics and artificial intelligence (AI) at Heriot-Watt University, will share its thoughts on the rapid advancement of AI in society and how people’s lives, work and learning will be impacted by the development of these technologies.
Also speaking at the event, taking place 7 October, is the National Robotarium’s Head of Robotics, Dr Ingo Keller, who will join a panel discussion with Jeanette and Chair JL Williams for a deep-dive into the future of robots and how human trust and relationships robots will evolve as the technology gets increasingly more sophisticated.
‘Jeanette Winterson: In Conversation with Ameca’ kicks-off EFI’s new season of events, Learning Curves, its first since renovation work was completed on the building. It also marks the first joint event delivered by EFI and The National Robotarium, both partner hubs of the Data-Driven Innovation initiative, funded as part of the Edinburgh and South-East Scotland City Region Deal to make the region the data capital of Europe.
A robot that can wink, laugh, and shrug is about to turn the National Robotarium in Edinburgh into its first home in the UK.
Ameca, which is made by British company Engineered Arts, will be used as part of the facility’s outreach work with school pupils and the general public to study humans’ reactions to robots.
The National Robotarium, the UK’s centre for robotics and artificial intelligence (AI) based at Heriot-Watt University in partnership with The University of Edinburgh, has purchased Ameca, making it the first place in the UK to have this state-of-the-art humanoid robot.
Described by Engineered Arts as the ‘world’s most advanced’ humanoid robot, Ameca’s sophisticated features include embedded microphones, cameras, facial recognition software, and articulated motorised components which enable it to interact with people in a natural and engaging way. By showcasing Ameca’s capabilities through its public outreach and education programmes, the National Robotarium will seek to break down barriers and build trust between humans and robots.
Ameca will be utilised as part of the National Robotarium’s outreach and engagement programme, helping to build trust in robotics and improve adoption.
The facility’s dedicated public engagement team will feature Ameca at various events, school visits, and workshops across Scotland and beyond, providing opportunities for people of all ages and backgrounds to interact directly with the robot and learn about the latest advancements in robotics and AI.
Researchers will also utilise Ameca to study public perceptions and attitudes towards humanoid robots, gathering valuable insights to inform the development of future technologies that prioritise trust, transparency, and user-friendliness.
Steve Maclaren is Chief Operating Officer at the National Robotarium. He said:
“The arrival of Ameca at the National Robotarium marks a significant step forward in our mission to make robotics more accessible and relatable to the people of Scotland, the UK and beyond. Since opening our doors in September 2022, we’ve successfully hosted more than 50 in-person and virtual events and engaged with 1000s of school-aged children.
“Ameca represents an exciting opportunity to build on that success and take public engagement to the next level. By giving people the chance to interact with this state-of-the-art humanoid robot firsthand, we aim to demystify robotics, foster trust in human-robot interaction, and showcase the remarkable potential of these technologies to improve our daily lives and benefit society as a whole.”
Will Jackson is the founder and CEO of Engineered Arts Ltd. He said:
“We are incredibly proud to have Ameca join the many preeminent robots at the National Robotarium. Meeting an AI-embodied humanoid robot is a unique experience that very few people have witnessed and we are very excited to be able to share what can be a profound moment with a wider audience.”
The National Robotarium is part of the Data-Driven Innovation initiative, supported by £21 million from the UK Government and £1.4 million from the Scottish Government. The initiative aims to turn Edinburgh into the data capital of Europe and is part of the wider £1.5 billion Edinburgh and South-East Scotland City Region Deal.
https://thenationalrobotarium.com/wp-content/uploads/Ben-38-scaled-e1724410004325.jpg6651000Louise Jackhttp://thenationalrobotarium.com/wp-content/uploads/Robotarium.pngLouise Jack2024-04-17 00:01:472024-04-16 12:20:58‘World’s most advanced’ humanoid robot arrives at the National Robotarium
Next-generation socially assistive robots have been successfully tested in a healthcare setting to assist patients, alleviate their anxiety, and relieve pressure on nursing staff as part of a hospital trial co-conducted by researchers from the National Robotarium in Paris, France.
The SPRING (Socially Assistive Robots in Gerontological healthcare) trial developed robots equipped with advanced artificial intelligence to enable natural conversations, understand patient needs, and assist hospital staff with routine tasks across three waves of experiments with elderly volunteers at Assistance Publique Hôpitaux de Paris.
Results show that robots were able to smoothly engage in social interactions like greeting patients, answering questions, and providing directions. Critically, robots are quickly demonstrating an ability to comprehend multi-party conversations – following dialogue between several individuals simultaneously.
By undertaking simple but repetitive duties, robots also reduced potential physical contact between clinicians and patients as part of the trial, with early feedback suggesting the use of socially assistive robots may lower infection transmission risk, while boosting productivity of nurses and doctors.
Anxiety and uncertainty can often precede a hospital visit and it is understood that this behaviour can be more pronounced in senior patients, with up to 20% of older adults suffering from the illness1. It is hoped that the availability of helpful and socially intelligent robots that can converse and answer initial screening questions whilst alleviating busy hospital staff could prove extremely beneficial in clinical settings.
Patients and companions make their enquiries with the ARI robot
Professor Anne-Sophie Rigaud, Head of Department at Assistance Publique Hôpitaux de Paris, said:
“Our patients are increasingly interested in robotics and the evolution of hospital services, which they see as the logical evolution of our society. We believe that the ARI robot could in future become an essential element of patient care in hospitals, thanks to its capacity for social interaction and guidance.
“Older adults have also expressed that they’re pleased with the design of the robot and thought that it would be useful to provide information and companionship to patients with cognitive disorders.”
The feasibility of implementing the SPRING project has been made possible by academics at the National Robotarium who have made major advances in developing large language models (LLM) that enable robots to be capable of natural and fluent conversations with groups of people.
The Paris trials have provided key insights into how this emerging technology can enhance care delivery and safety whilst simultaneously advancing innovations in areas like computer vision, audio processing and human-robot interaction which have potential for further global applications.
The €8.4 million collaborative SPRING project includes researchers from Heriot Watt University, the National Robotarium, the Czech Technical University, Bar Ilan University Israel, University of Trento Italy, Assistance Publique Hôpitaux de Paris, PAL Robotics Spain, ERM AUtomatismes France, and is coordinated by Inria France. SPRING received support from Horizon 2020, a programme funded by the European Union.
The National Robotarium is part of the Data-Driven Innovation initiative, supported by £21 million from the UK Government and £1.4 million from the Scottish Government. The initiative aims to turn Edinburgh into the data capital of Europe and is part of the wider £1.3 billion Edinburgh and South-East Scotland City Region Deal.
Professor Oliver Lemon, academic co-lead at the National Robotarium
Oliver Lemon is a professor of AI and academic co-lead at the National Robotarium. He said:
“Today’s rapid advances in AI are truly inspiring and open up a world of possibilities for its positive impact on various sectors, including healthcare. One of the most significant contributions of robotics and AI is its ability to conserve resources and alleviate human workload, therefore providing valuable new tools for enhancing healthcare delivery.
“The prospect of robots seamlessly collaborating with hospital staff to enhance the patient experience is now closer to reality. Promising initial trials at Assistance Publique Hôpitaux de Paris have demonstrated our robot’s ability to converse effectively with patients and their companions simultaneously.
“We believe that the SPRING project marks a significant milestone in the development of interactive robotics, and we are proud of its achievements, while recognising the exciting challenges that lie ahead.”
UK Government Minister for Scotland, Malcolm Offord, said:
“The early trials into helper robots successfully demonstrates the great potential such advanced technology has to deliver vital support to health staff, improve patient care and prevent the spread of infections and diseases.
“The UK Government has invested £21 million in the National Robotarium helping foster world-leading research and support high quality jobs, investment and growth, as part of our more than £2.9 billion investment to level up across Scotland.”
Scottish Government Wellbeing Economy, Fair Work and Energy Secretary, Neil Gray, said:
“I welcome this progress using artificial intelligence to help ease the pressure on health service staff.
“With Scottish Government support, the National Robotarium is using cutting edge research to help drive innovation and artificial intelligence to deliver creative solutions to real world challenges.”
https://thenationalrobotarium.com/wp-content/uploads/ARI-INRIA-4-scaled.jpg14402560Louise Jackhttp://thenationalrobotarium.com/wp-content/uploads/Robotarium.pngLouise Jack2024-01-31 00:01:252024-01-31 09:23:00Socially assistive robots deployed in Paris hospital to ease pressure on staff and reassure patients
Professor Lemon, whose background is focused on Artificial Intelligence (AI), brings many years of experience developing machine learning and Natural Language Processing (NLP) models, building knowledge to better understand how robots can interact with humans using conversational speech in visual and spatial use-cases. Current projects being led by Professor Lemon include SPRING, based at the facility’s state-of-the-art HRI labs, which is developing Socially Assistive Robotics to perform multi-person interactions in complex environments, specifically with older patients in hospitals and other healthcare settings.
A former Senior Research Fellow at Stanford University and the University of Edinburgh, and Visiting Scientist at NASA, Professor Lemon has extensive experience working with industry. He has led national and international research projects with partners such as PAL Robotics, SoftBank, France Telecom, and BMW, and is Chief AI Officer and co-founder of the conversational AI company Alana AI. The spinout has recently developed advanced vision-and-language conversational AI solutions for blind and partially-sighted people in partnership with RNIB (Royal National Institute for the Blind) and for stroke patients, as part of the European Commission’s RES-Q+ medical AI project.
Professor Lemon has also supervised three student teams in the Amazon Alexa Simbot Challenge, an artificial intelligence competition focused on conversational agents. In the latest challenge, on embodied AI, the team were the only non-US competitors to be shortlisted in the top ten, and made it all the way through to the final stages.
His appointment follows the departure of Professor Helen Hastie, who has held the position – alongside incumbent Professor Yvan Petillot – since 2020, overseeing the research strategy of the world-leading Robotics and Artificial Intelligence centre, based at Heriot-Watt University. Working closely with co-academic leads at the University of Edinburgh, Professors Adam Stokes and Sethu Vijayakumar, these important roles were created to strengthen academic collaboration between the two partner institutions. The ties between organisations will be further strengthened when Professor Hastie takes up a new post as Head of the School of Informatics at The University of Edinburgh.
Professor Lemon said: “I’m delighted to join the National Robotarium as its new co-academic lead and continue its work developing science-led robotics and AI solutions to address people’s needs.
”As a co-founder of Alana AI, I understand how to bridge the gap between science and industry and move academic research from labs to market, a core delivery theme at the National Robotarium. I look forward to playing a strategic role supporting its mission to advance the adoption of robotics and AI to help people at work and at home. I’m particularly excited to bring the latest advances in Foundation Models and Large Language Models such as ChatGPT into robotics.”
Stewart Miller, Chief Executive Officer at the National Robotarium said: “I’m very pleased to welcome Oliver to the National Robotarium as our new co-academic lead. His extensive experience into language models for robotics, as well as his many years of research into how humans interact with robots, make him a natural successor to Professor Hastie and I’m keen to work with him to develop the next generation of robotics using safe and responsible AI.”
https://thenationalrobotarium.com/wp-content/uploads/MicrosoftTeams-image-30-scaled-1.jpg25602388Louise Jackhttp://thenationalrobotarium.com/wp-content/uploads/Robotarium.pngLouise Jack2023-07-14 10:12:012023-10-24 12:06:36Professor Oliver Lemon named as new co-academic lead at the National Robotarium
A team of robotics researchers from the National Robotarium, supported by Heriot-Watt University and the University of Edinburgh, are through to the semi-finals of Amazon’s Alexa Prize SimBot Challenge – an artificial intelligence competition focused on conversational robots.
Team EMMA, the only non-US team to be shortlisted for the competition, have been developing an embodied conversational agent since the challenge launched in October 2021. Since July 2022, they have been competing in the ‘live interactions’ development phase, during which the agent has been interacting with real Amazon Alexa customers who provided real-time ratings, reviews and feedback.
The next stage of the challenge involves using Amazon’s new Echo Show device, which has a screen to show the robot moving around, as well as speakers and a microphone. The SimBot Challenge involves using various kinds of data, including user feedback, to train a virtual robot to follow human commands.
Dr Alessandro Suglia (pictured above, centre), a tenure-track research fellow in Robotics and Autonomous Systems, leads the team and said:
“It’s amazing to reach the semi-finals of such a prestigious and important competition in the artificial intelligence field.
“It was fun – but also challenging – to work through Amazon’s list of missions for our robot. Using spoken instructions only, we had to get it to do things in its virtual world from pouring milk to fixing a fuse box. We are basically developing the AI that underpins these commands and how the robot moves around its environment to do these things for the user.”
The semi-finals phase of the Alexa Prize SimBot Challenge runs from 2nd February to 22nd March 2023. If Team EMMA reach the finals, they will be competing with three other teams for the first prize of $500,000. The team have already received a grant of $250,000 from Amazon to develop their AI prototype.
The other Team EMMA members are Amit Parekh, a second-year PhD student focused on multi-agent negotiation, and three students from the EPSRC Centre for Doctoral Training in Robotics and Autonomous Systems. These are Hemanthage Supun Bhathiya, a second year PhD student working on multimodal conversational AI; Maria-Vasiliki (Malvina) Nikandrou, a second year PhD student working on continual learning techniques for vision and language models, and Georgios Michail Pantazopoulos, a first year PhD student developing novel techniques to improve the generalisation skills of multimodal machine learning models.
https://thenationalrobotarium.com/wp-content/uploads/TAS-Handshake-Web.jpeg6751200Louise Jackhttp://thenationalrobotarium.com/wp-content/uploads/Robotarium.pngLouise Jack2023-02-14 11:54:282023-09-27 17:05:25Team EMMA through to semi-finals of Amazon Alexa Challenge
Researchers at the National Robotarium, hosted by Heriot-Watt University and the University of Edinburgh, are developing advanced ‘machine learning’ algorithms that will significantly improve the detection, intervention and prevention of online gender-based abuse.
The project has been awarded £1 million of funding from UK Research and Innovation (UKRI) and will create state-of-the-art AI tools that use a broad variety of viewpoints, perspectives and experiences to improve the detection of online abuse. The project has been set up by researchers at the National Robotarium in response to a recent report published by Glitch, the UK’s leading charity against online abuse.
The report by Glitch highlights the current “epidemic of online abuse” being experienced particularly by women and non-binary people, with 46% of those reported experiencing attacks online since the beginning of COVID-19. 29% of people who had experienced online abuse prior to the pandemic reported it being worse during lockdown.
Gender was the most frequently cited reason for online abuse, with 48% of respondents reported suffering from gender-based online violence.
National Robotarium researchers will engage with experts on gender-based violence and online harassment to build mechanisms that automatically generate counter-narratives aimed at perpetrators and a chatbot for providing proactive support to victims and survivors.
A key ambition of the project is to increase digital literacy concerning the safe use of social media from an early age. This will be achieved through the development of learning materials which focus on helping children identify what online gender-based abuse is and how to deal with it.
Additional outcomes from the project will include data on the type and frequency of online abuse experienced by victims. New and updated datasets will be shared with the wider research community for the purposes of developing further strategies.
The National Robotarium is part of the Data-Driven Innovation initiative and is supported by £21 million from the UK Government and £1.4 million from the Scottish Government through the £1.3 billion Edinburgh and South East Scotland City Region Deal – a 15 year investment programme jointly funded by both governments and regional partners.
Principal investigator and professor of conversational AI at the National Robotarium, Verena Rieser, said:
“Figures like those included in the Glitch report continue to highlight the discriminatory effect of gender-based online abuse and the disproportionate impact it has on non-binary people and women.
One challenge is that the current means of identifying and defining abuse often relies on majority social viewpoints. From our research, we know these viewpoints don’t necessarily correlate with the experiences of victims.
“Our approach is based on the framework laid out by the Scottish Government’s Equally Safe strategy which aims to prevent violence against women, young people and children. In addition to automatically detecting online abuse, it will aim to rethink what it is we need to detect, how best to support victims and the role education can play as a tool for prevention.
“Outcomes from the project will help create online spaces that are equally safe irrespective of someone’s gender, race or background and provide more effective and transparent means of moderation – giving users more control over their online experiences.”
Co-researcher and reader in computer science education at the National Robotarium, Dr Fiona McNeill, said:
“Activities to mitigate online gender-based violence tend to focus on adults, but this is a huge problem for children and young people as well. As part of the project being driven by the National Robotarium, we will be working with young people to understand their experiences of online abuse, the language they use around this and the way in which young victims need to be supported.
“Through this interactive work, we will create educational materials that help young people understand and recognise online gender-based violence, to gain confidence in responding to it – either as a victim or a bystander – and to recognise if they are perpetrating it.”
UK Government Minister for Scotland, Iain Stewart, said:
“Hate speech and harassment are just as unacceptable online as they are offline. For too long online platforms have enabled the most vile forms of targeted abuse with almost no consequences for perpetrators, and minimal support and protection for victims.
“I am hopeful that this research into new AI algorithms will deliver a valuable tool in fighting back and creating safer online environments.
“In March, the UK Government introduced the Online Safety Bill to bring a new era of accountability online, including clamping down on anonymous trolls and making companies tackle harmful content quicker.”
“Everyone should feel equally safe and respected, whether online or offline. As a key component of the City Region Deal, the team behind the National Robotarium is working to help tackle online abuse, using artificial intelligence to help make our society more inclusive.
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“This work will drive positive social and cultural change, with the potential to create an impact felt far beyond Edinburgh and the South East of Scotland.” – Scottish Government Economy Secretary, Kate Forbes MSP
https://thenationalrobotarium.com/wp-content/uploads/Online-GBV.jpg7661280Louise Jackhttp://thenationalrobotarium.com/wp-content/uploads/Robotarium.pngLouise Jack2022-06-20 11:58:072022-09-27 11:55:45AI algorithm to help tackle ‘epidemic’ of gender-based online abuse
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