I am interested in developing algorithms and software for simulating and synthesizing motion for complex kinematic and dynamic systems. This research involves interdisciplinary work in robotics, computer graphics, and computational geometry.
Fundamental to motion synthesis research is the development of efficient search techniques. Solving a motion synthesis problem involves constructing a suitable model and searching an appropriate space of possibilities. I am interested in developing efficient motion planning algorithms for searching high-dimensional configuration spaces, with applications ranging from path planning for autonomous robots, humanoids and animated characters, CAD assembly analysis (part removability and maintenance), and computer-aided drug design.
For the past several years, I have been building general software components for autonomous humanoids based on planning, sensing, and control. This has concurrently involved researching techniques for automatically generating gross body motions for complex simulated models of human figures given high-level navigation or manipulation task commands, as well as generating motion trajectories for real humanoid robot hardware. Specifically, I have focused on path planning for obstacle avoidance, balance control, self-collision detection, footstep placement, and integrated sensor feedback systems.
I am researching methods to automatically generate motion for animated characters. The goal is to create software that will enable an autonomous virtual human to move naturally in response to task-level commands such as "walk over to the table and pick up the book''. The underlying software automatically generates the motion necessary to perform the given task. I am also interested in developing general techniques for efficient modeling, rendering, and animation of complex geometric models such as articulated characters.
|Research Interest Keywords|
|animation, artificial intelligence, graphics, human motion simulation, humanoid robotics, legged locomotion, motion planning, obstacle avoidance, planning and scheduling|
|The Robotics Institute is part of the School of Computer Science, Carnegie Mellon University.|
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