2014 IEEE-RAS International Conference on Humanoid Robots. November 18-20th 2014. Madrid. Spain. YoutubeGoogle+FacebookTwitterEmail
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In memory of MIKE

In the IEEE RAS Humanoids 2014 Conference members of the humanoid robotics community will pay tribute to Mike Stilman.

Assistant Professor Mike Stilman, recognized as an emerging leader in humanoid robotics research passed away unexpectedly on May 6th, 2014.

Stilman, who was recently awarded tenure and scheduled to be promoted to associate professor joined the Georgia Tech faculty in 2008 after receiving his Ph.D. in robotics from the Robotics Institute at Carnegie Mellon University.

An active member of the Institute for Robotics and Intelligent Machines (IRIM) at Tech, Stilman founded the Humanoid Robotics Lab, also known as Golems.org, where he led a team of graduate students and researchers on projects designed to develop “robot brains,” or algorithms, capable of the same level of dexterity, intelligent planning and interaction as human brains.

As an assistant professor in the School of Interactive Computing, Stilman oversaw the research projects of 16 graduate students and several undergraduates. Recognized by students as a favorite in the classroom, he taught several robotics courses, including Robot Intelligence and Humanoid Robotics, and earned the Class of 1940 W. Roane Beard Outstanding Teacher Award for the past academic year.

Known for his enthusiasm for humanoids (his Georgia license plate reads “GOLEM”) as well as his abundance of energy, Stilman was active in the broader robotics research community. Most recently, he chaired the IEEE RAS Humanoids 2013 Conference in Atlanta and led Tech’s participation in the DARPA Robotics Challenge.

Stilman was among 25 researchers nationwide selected for a 2013 Young Faculty Award by the Defense Advanced Research Project Agency (DARPA). Also, he received several significant research contracts involving his two humanoid robots, Golem Krang and Golem Hubo, including a $900,000 grant from the Office of Naval Research to develop a “hybrid reasoning system”. The new system could lead to robots that improvise, using objects in their environments to creatively complete complex tasks, such as climbing a chair to escape a building.