Small, light-weight flying robots such as the 20-gram DelFly Explorer form an extreme challenge to Artificial Intelligence, because of the strict limitations in onboard sensors, processing, and memory. I try to uncover general principles of intelligence that will allow such limited, small robots to perform complex tasks.
Vision is a prime sense for both animals and robots. I create efficient vision algorithms for robot control and navigation.
Fruit flies are able to fly, avoid obstacles, navigate, and socially interact with each other with only a 100,000 neurons. Insects are a rich source of inspiration for elegant, efficient AI.
As Rodney Brooks said: "Simulation is doomed to succeed" - I focus on problems actually faced by robots in the real world.
Please click below to have a look at a selection of my current research projects.
Last few years, I worked together with ESA and MIT on an experiment, in which a drone learns to see in zero gravity. Yesterday, ESA presented our joint work at the International Astronautical Congress in Mexico. In the experiment, the drone started to fly based on stereo vision with two cameras, but learned online to […]
Yesterday I went to the first Dutch drone festival to talk about (and demonstrate) small autonomous flying robots. This weekend the festival in Hilv ersum Media Park continues, for instance with FPV drone racing workshops!
Today I gave a lecture on smart robots at the Delft Science Center, discussing the intelligence of big robots such as self-driving cars and small robots, such as lightweight drones. Great to see such a mix of young and old people interested enough in this topic to sacrifice a sunny Sunday morning for it
