What is MorphoTalks?
Morphotalks is a series of monthly seminars on Morphological Computation (MC) at the Bristol Robotics Lab. The seminar uses MC as an umbrella term covering areas such as embodied intelligence, passive dynamics, reservoir computing...and beyond. All seminars take place in the BRL seminar room & Online (via Teams or Zoom) and are recorded.
After an exciting First Season, we have now started MorphoTalks Season 2! Stay tuned for updates on events and speakers.
What to expect?
MC is sparking an increasing interest in research across multi-disciplinary areas. Therefore, these seminars will enable us to bring state-of-the-art research, discuss emerging trends and share our interpretations and applications of MC with the aim to encourage networking and collaboration. We have lined up renowned researchers in robotics, biology, cognitive science, philosophy (and more!) to discuss cutting-edge topics that we believe you’ll be interested in! We will, of course, curate these seminars with your valuable input as we progress.
A typical seminar will look as follows:
Talk by a guest speaker outside of Bristol and a researcher within Bristol (UoB, UWE, BRL).
Q&A, discussions and debates about MC ...and beyond!
For guest speakers coming to BRL, a lab tour will be provided
Upcoming Talks - Wednesday, March 20th
Our next MorphoTalks will take place ONLINE on Wednesday, March 20th from 10:30 until 12.
Zoom link: https://bristol-ac-uk.zoom.us/j/96090983044?pwd=U3FxMDN5b2NJU2VCS1NydVNtaE5Vdz09
Our first speaker will be Professor Sabine Hauert, Professor of Swarm Engineering at the University of Bristol and Bristol Robotics Laboratory and President & Co-founder of the Robohub podcast.
Title: Swarms for People
Abstract: As robot swarms move from the laboratory to application, we will need to make them easy to design, monitor, control, and validate. Yet the decentralised nature of swarms makes each of these steps challenging. In this talk we look at mechanisms to make 'swarms for people', in applications ranging from medicine to environmental monitoring and logistics. We highlight technical properties of swarms, such as proficiency, scalability, robustness, and adaptability and their role in building trust. Finally, we discuss the future of swarm robotics and conclude by suggesting areas of advancement which may help build human and society’s trust towards robot swarms.
Our second speaker will be Professor Rudolf M. Füchslin, Professor of Applied Complex Systems Science at Zurich University of Applied Sciences.
Title: Morphological Process Control: Morphological Computing Brings a Novel Perspective into the Life Sciences
Abstract: This talk presents a non-robotic perspective on morphological computing and control. First, I present work that explores the potential of spatially heterogeneous chemistries, the consequence of spatial organization on evolutionary dynamics, and our understanding of complex control in the chemical process management in biological cells. I will discuss evolutionary dynamics presenting older work, and I will refer to two recent collaborative projects (ACDC and Bio-HhOST) in which we aspire to build up aggregates of biological and artificial cells for studying, e.g. tumour cells. Bio-HhOST aspires to replace the "tissue" with some artificial soft–matter structures (e.g. vesicles, that is, liquid enclosed by a lipid bilayer), which are hoped to mimic biological tissue cells but are much simpler than those and produced under reproducible laboratory conditions. There are two main rationales for this approach: The behaviour of biological cells in tissue differs from that of isolated cells. However, natural tissue is hard to control and standardize. As a researcher in applied science, I will discuss this branch of research's somewhat particular situation and features. Partly caused by my research about spatially heterogeneous dynamics, I did a lot of modelling for the Swiss government during the pandemic. I will present some general lessons I learned about modelled–based decision support and the interface between science and politics.
Past Talks Season 1
Thank you to all our previous speakers! All recordings of MorphoTalks Season 1 are available on our YouTube channel, starring:
Professor Josh Bongard (University of Vermont): “From rigid to soft to biological robots”
Professor Andy Philippides (University of Sussex): “Exploiting embodied dynamics in insect-inspired robotic navigation”
PhD student Emanuel Nunez Sardinha (Bristol Robotics Laboratory): “Embedding Soft Synergies into Soft Materials for Intrinsic Compliant Robotic Hand Grasping”
Dr Thomas George-Thuruthel (University of Cambridge): “Learning to let go: Minimalistic controllers for soft robots”
Dr Martin How (University of Bristol): “The visual ecology of cuttlefish”
Dr Simon Bowes (University of Sussex): “Emergence: Reentrant structures as the basis for ontological surprise"
Professor Michael Levin (Tuft University): “Xenobots, AI and You: Ubiquitous unconventional, multiscale, diverse intelligence of biology”
Dr Hemma Philamore (University of Bristol, Bristol Robotics Laboratory): "Life doesn’t survive in isolation"
Dr Tom Froese (Okinawa Institute of Science and Technology (OIST)): “Using irresolvable tensions to drive system self-optimization”
PhD student Matthew Uppington (University of Bristol & University of the West of England): “Towards Photo-contractile Swarms of Protocellular Robotic Agents”
Past Talks Season 2
Thank you to all our previous speakers! All recordings of MorphoTalks Season 2 are available on our YouTube channel, starring:
Professor Fumiya Iida (University of Cambridge): “From Bio-Inspired Soft Robotics to Morphological Computation and Embodied Intelligence”
Dr Van Ho (Ho lab, Japan Advanced Institute of Science and Technology, JAIST): “Adaptive Morphology and Embodied Intelligence towards Safe, Intelligent, and Resilient Human-Robots Coexistence”
Organizers
The organizers of MorphoTalks are Estelle Raffy and Vijay Chandiramani. If you have any questions or if you want to give a talk please get in touch.