NEW: Winner of the IROS 2012 RoboCup@Work Competition: "LUHbots" from Leibniz University of Hannover, Germany.
Objective
Robot competition events provide challenging atmospheres for innovation, attracting researchers from multiple fields. A new RoboCup@Work competition will take place during IROS 2012 tackling mobile manipulation scenarios. Prospective teams should develop relevant scientific and technological solutions.
Challenges
RoboCup@Work is a new RoboCup competition that targets the use of robots in work-related scenarios. The RoboCup@Work scenarios target difficult, mostly unsolved problems in robotics, artificial intelligence, and advanced computer science, in particular in perception, path planning and motion planning, mobile manipulation, planning and scheduling, learning and adaptivity, and probabilistic modeling, to name just a few. Furthermore, RoboCup@Work scenarios may also address problems for which solutions require the use and integration of semantic web technology, RFID technology, or advanced computational geometry. Examples for the work-related scenarios targeted by RoboCup@Work include:
• loading and/or unloading of containers with/of objects with the same or different size,
• pickup or delivery of parts from/to structured storages and/or unstructured heaps,
• operation of machines, including pressing buttons, opening/closing doors and drawers, and similar operations with underspecified or unknown kinematics,
• flexible planning and dynamic scheduling of production processes involving multiple agents (humans, robots, and machines),
• cooperative assembly of non-trivial objects, with other robots and/or humans,
• cooperative collection of objects over spatially widely distributed areas, and
• cooperative transportation of objects (robots with robots, robots with humans).
Important Dates
- ASAP: Competition rules online;
- July 25, 2012: Deadline for submission of applications;
- July 31, 2012: Notification of qualified teams;
- October 7-11, 2012: Competition takes place in Vilamoura, Algarve, Portugal;
- October 7-10, 2012: Team setup and qualification rounds; room Neptune;
- October 11, 2012 (morning): Final rounds and awards ceremony;
- October 11, 2012 (afternoon): Workshop on "Robot Competitions: Benchmarking, Technology Transfer and Education", including presentations by the 2 Best Teams on each competition.
Application Details and Team Selection Process
Applications should clearly state the selected challenge and include the following materials:
i) Video with real robot experiments or simulations of the proposed approach, meeting the corresponding competition rules (max video duration: 3 mn; max video file size: 50 Mb);
ii) Short paper (max 4 pages 2 column, 11 pt, IEEE IROS format) with a technical and scientific description of the approach, pointing out innovative aspects;
iii) One A4 page with team CVs.
IMPORTANT: items ii)+iii) must be submitted in 1 single pdf file.
The selection of qualified teams will be carried out by an International Program Committee composed of renowned Robotics scientists, including robot competition experts, based on submitted materials.
Qualified teams will have to show their approaches applied to real robots during the actual IROS Competitions. Robots from different manufacturers, including self-made robots, can be used. KUKA will make available a few youBot robots, whose simulator is available at http://youbot-store.com/software.aspx.
International Program Committee
The selection of teams will be performed by an Interational Program Committee composed of the following researchers:
- Rainer Bischoff, KUKA Laboratories, Germany;
- Gerhard Kraetzschmar, Bonn-Rhein-Sieg University, Germany;
- Erwin Prassler, Bonn-Rhein-Sieg University, Germany;
- Bill Smart, Oregon State University, USA.
Submissions
An email should be sent to competitions@iros2012.org, with:
Subject: RoboCup@Work
Body: Web link pointing to the video
Attachment: A single pdf file with items ii)+iii)
DO NOT attach the video
Organizers
Rui Cortesão, Institute for Systems and Robotics, University of Coimbra;
Pedro Lima, Institute for Systems and Robotics/LARSyS, IST, TU Lisbon
More information
More information on contest rules, technical details and alike can be found in the contest website.
