With more and more robots headed for the commercial world, a Waterloo Engineering researcher hopes to speed their arrival by developing cheaper, general-purpose control systems.
At the moment, the high cost of customized robotics applications in workplaces such as warehouses and manufacturing plants largely limits them to huge companies with plenty of money to invest.
Stephen Smith, a professor of electrical and computer engineering, is building a team at Waterloo Engineering to develop cheaper control systems for robots.
But with help from a $140,000 Early Researcher award announced today (read the full article here), Professor Stephen Smith is building a research team to make robots affordable for smaller operations with “plug-and-play” systems that would only have to be adjusted and adapted, not built from scratch.
“Essentially, you’ll press ‘go’ and the robot will start executing,” said Smith, a professor of electrical and computer engineering who specializes in control and motion algorithms for mobile robots, especially multiple mobile robots. “Possibly it’ll stop a few times to ask if it’s doing things right and obtain feedback.”
'Exciting time to be working in robotics'
In addition to the Early Researcher funding above, to be provided over five years, Smith was awarded $120,000 in June through the federal government’s Discovery Accelerator Supplements Program for research on real-time motion planning for complex robotics tasks.
He expects the field to explode over the next few years, fuelled by massive investments by major technology companies, and looks forward to playing a role, including projects with companies such as Clearpath Robotics of Kitchener, which was started by four Waterloo Engineering graduates.
“They’ll become something you see all over the place,” said Smith. “It’s an exciting time to be working in robotics.”