Center for Computing and Information Science<\/a>\u00a0home, where Wang says \u201cother researchers can come to utilize the MCROS for indoor robot-related experiments.\u201d Zhu explains that the robot system can also \u201cbe deployed in the field, in the wild. So it can help researchers to do some dangerous things.\u201d<\/p>\n\u201cIt will be able to do anything from teaching a foreign language to sampling plants to see if they are ready to harvest,\u201d says Tuininga. In fact, the robot system will shortly begin working with a vertical farm in Hackensack once some more parts are purchased.<\/p>\n
Tuininga explains, \u201cOur vertical farm partners are partnering with a program for adults with autism. We can use the language development component to work with people with disabilities at the same time as the plant sensing. Since it\u2019s collaborative, the scientists and the adults with autism and the robot are all learning from each other.\u201d<\/p>\n
In addition, the robot system will aim to open up the STEM field to more students, especially female students and underrepresented minorities, with tangible and engaging hands-on projects in robot-supported courses and outreach programs.<\/p>\n
Besides connecting multiple disciplines within the University, the system will ultimately connect the University nationwide to scholars, helping researchers at Ä¢¹½ÊÓƵ to launch robotics workshops with the state-of-the-art robotics knowledge and activities for local K-12 students, especially those from underserved districts, contributing to the development and diversity of the future high-tech workforce for New Jersey and the country.<\/p>\n
But before the robot has its world debut next April or May, there is a lot of work to be done.<\/p>\n
\u201cBefore you teach the MCROS, it\u2019s just a machine,\u201d says Wang. \u201cThe MCROS will learn from human demonstrations to make itself smarter just like a student will learn from teachers.\u201d<\/p>\n
Adds Zhu: \u201cAnybody can buy the hardware, but then we also make the robot intelligent by developing different artificial intelligence software. With the software, the robot will be tailored to each different domain, each different problem.\u201d<\/p>\n
Tuininga says the project is \u201csharing the expertise of computer science with the whole University.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is the beginning. It\u2019s a gateway to allow many, many new possibilities for collaborations across campus and outside of campus for human and technology interaction.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cAnother feature is the uniqueness of our University,\u201d says Wang. \u201cWe will have a lot of applications across subjects, from multiple colleges, multiple departments. The unique feature for our robot system is collaboration.\u201d<\/p>\n
Story by Staff Writer\u00a0Mary Barr Mann<\/strong>. Photo by University Photographer\u00a0Mike Peters<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"National Science Foundation grant helps build robot system connecting research throughout campus<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":34,"featured_media":209843,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[7,12,14],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-209842","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-research","category-pseg-iss","category-school-of-computing"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.montclair.edu\/csam\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/209842","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.montclair.edu\/csam\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.montclair.edu\/csam\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.montclair.edu\/csam\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/34"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.montclair.edu\/csam\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=209842"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.montclair.edu\/csam\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/209842\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":210421,"href":"https:\/\/www.montclair.edu\/csam\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/209842\/revisions\/210421"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.montclair.edu\/csam\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/209843"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.montclair.edu\/csam\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=209842"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.montclair.edu\/csam\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=209842"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.montclair.edu\/csam\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=209842"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}