Richard T. Vaughan Professor School of Computing Science Simon Fraser University vaughan@sfu.ca and AI/ML Senior Engineering Manager, Apple Cupertino, California

Research

autonomous mobile robots; multi-robot systems; human-robot interaction, robot software engineering

I direct the Autonomy Lab. Our research goal is to increase the capabilities, robustness and overall autonomy of mobile robot systems. My research has these main themes:

• applying the latest AI-based sensing techniques to robot navigation and human-robot interaction
• creating tools and techniques for programming, simulating and evaluating populations of robots
• applying models of animal behavior to extend or improve robots, particularly multi-robot systems

My lab is part of the NSERC Field Robotics Network.

I am an Associate Member of the Behavioural Ecology Research Group at SFU.

A video of a November 2018 research talk for a general audience (YouTube)

Publications

• Autonomy Lab / Publications
• Google Scholar
• YouTube channel

Students

• Autonomy Lab / People

Teaching

Current semester

• None. On leave from SFU.

Previous semesters

• CMPT127: Computing Laboratory
• CMPT882: Special Topics in AI: Distributed Robot and Sensor Systems
• CMPT431: Distributed Systems
• CMPT889: Special topics in interdisciplinary computing science: Autonomous robots
• CMPT128: Introduction to computing science for engineers
• CMPT300: Operating Systems I
• CMPT401: Operating Systems II
• CMPT415: Directed study: Autonomous robots

Software

• GitHub/rtv
• GitHub/AutonomyLab
• Player Project

Selected Talks

• Nov 2018: SFU President's Faculty Lecture, Surrey, BC. Canada. Host: Andrew Petter
• May 2018: Keynote, ICRA 2018, Brisbane, Australia. Host: Peter Corke
• Nov 2017: Invited talk, School of Computer Science, McGill University, Montreal, Canada. Host: Greg Dudek
• Mar 2017: Robotics Colloqium, University of Washington, Seattle, USA. Host: Dieter Fox
• Feb 2017. Invited talk, Bristol Robotics Labs, Bristol, UK. Host: Chris Melhuish

Service

• Program Chair
  • IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Robotics and Automation (IROS 2017)
  • Canadian Conference on Computer and Robot Vision (2007, 2008)
• Administration
  • IEEE Robotics and Automation Society
    • Administrative Committee (ADCOM) (2015-2019)
    • Conference Activities Board (2015-)
    • Technical Activities Board(2015-)
  • Simon Fraser University
    • Director of Undergraduate Programs, School of Computing Science (2011-2015)
• Editorial Boards
  • Autonomous Robots journal (2012-)
  • Journal of Software Engineering in Robotics (2010-)
• Associate Editor
  • IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA) (2010-2013)
• Selected Program / Review Committees
  • RSS, ICRA, IROS, AAAI, IJCAI, ALife, AAMAS, ANTS, ECAL, SAB
• Awards
  • Japan Toy Culture Foundation Novel Technology Paper Award for Amusement Culture, IROS, Japan (2016 and 2018)
  • CIPPRS Award for Excellence in Service to the Research Community, Canada (2009)
  • Best Paper, Symposium on Intelligent Robotic Systems, UK (1998)

Previously

• Member of Technical Staff, HRL Laboratories (2001-2003)
• Postdoc, University of Southern California (1998-2001)
• DPhil Computation, University of Oxford (1999)
• BA Artificial Intelligence, University of Sussex (1993)