The robot "concept" was clearly established by those many creative historical realizations, such as those recalled above. Nonetheless, the emergence of the "physical" robot had to await the advent of its underlying technologies of mechanics, controls, computers, electronics and sensors in one word, mechatronics during the course of the twentieth century. As always, new designs motivate new research and discoveries which, in turn, lead to enhanced solutions and thus to novel concepts. This virtuous circle over time produced that knowledge and understanding which gave birth to the field of Robotics, properly referred to as the science and technology of robots.

To make robots and intelligent machines useful to humans it is necessary to have a broad and tight intersection between Robotics and AI. Sophisticated mathematical models are needed that enable the robot from a physical point of view, as well as intelligent algorithms capable of correlating all the information coming from the use of technologically advanced sensors with the data available from experience. It is expected that the synergy of model-based techniques with data-driven approaches will contribute to increasing the level of autonomy of robots and intelligent machines in the near future.

The first book of the Robotics Goes MOOC project starts with the journey of robotics in the introductory chapter by Khatib, who has pioneered our field of robotics and has ferried it to the third millennium. Sensing is crucial for the development of intelligent and autonomous robots, as covered in Chapter 2 by Nuchter et al. Model-based control is dealt with in Chapter 3 by Kroeeger et al along with motion planning, as well as in Chapter 4 by Villani and Chapter 5 by Chaumette to handle force and visual feedback, respectively, when interacting with the environment. Resorting to AI techniques is the focus of the last part of the book, namely, Chapter 6 by Peters et al on Learning, Chapter 7 byBeetz et al on knowledge representation and reasoning, and Chapter 8 by Burgard et al on graph-based SLAM.

About the Author

Bruno Siciliano is professor of robotics and control at the University of Naples Federico II. He is also Honorary Professor at the University of Obuda where he holds the Kalman Chair. His research interests include manipulation and control, human-robot cooperation, and service robotics. Fellow of the scientific societies IEEE, ASME, IFAC, AAIA, he received numerous international prizes and awards, including the recent 2024 IEEE Robotics and Automation Pioneer Award. He was President of the IEEE Robotics and Automation Society from 2008 to 2009. He has delivered more than 150 keynotes and has published more than 300 papers and 7 books. His book "Robotics" is among the most adopted academic texts worldwide, while his edited volume "Springer Handbook of Robotics" received the highest recognition for scientific publishing: the 2008 PROSE Award for Excellence in Physical Sciences & Mathematics. His team has received more than 25 million Euro funding in the last 15 years from competitive European research projects, including two ERC grants.

Book Information
ISBN 9783319740942
Author Bruno Siciliano
Format Paperback
Page Count 190
Imprint Springer International Publishing AG
Publisher Springer International Publishing AG