Europe is facing a number of challenges that have impact on the future quality of life and prosperity of EU citizens. Robots can be a solution to some of these challenges, because European citizens can be users of robots and take advantage of their help in daily life, but also because Europe is at the forefront of robotics research and manufacturing and thus robots can help creating new jobs.
The envisaged impact of robotics relies on scientific and technological progress in robotics. New paradigms are emerging and they can be adopted for the next generation of Robot Companions.
The FLAG-ERA RoboCom++ Project, the main proposer of this Workshop, aims at exploring new frontiers for Robot Companions and at setting the frame of a new FET-Flagship initiative on Robotics.
The proposed Workshop will focus on the discussion of critical and emerging topics in this field. In particular it aims to:
- investigate the concepts of embodied intelligence, morphological computation and simplexity;
- analyse the revolutionary potential of soft robotics;
- explore the development of alternative energy sources;
- investigate the different aspects of embodied cooperative and communication processes;
- investigate how to make Robot Companions “accepted” at any social scale and estimate qualitatively and quantitatively the impact of the pervasive use of Robot Companions on jobs, productivity, sustainability, social welfare and economy.
The organizers and the speakers are well known in the field of science-based robotics and include representatives from industry. They are active and highly qualified in the critical and emerging topics addressed by the Workshop. Therefore the proposed Workshop will offer to the participants both the academic and the industrial viewpoints on the needs and features of a next generation of Robot Companions for citizens.
The workshop also stand as an opportunity for discussing about the Proposal for a Preparatory Action for a FET Flagship on Robotics.