Daniela Rus is the Andrew (1956) and Erna Viterbi Professor of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, Director of the Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory (CSAIL) at MIT. Prof. Rus's research interests are in robotics and artificial intelligence. The key focus of her research is to develop the science and engineering of autonomy and intelligence. Prof. Rus served as a member of the President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology (PCAST), the Defense Innovation Board, and as a USA expert for Global Partnerships in AI. She is a senior visiting fellow at MITRE Corporation. She earned her PhD in Computer Science from Cornell University. Prof. Rus aspires to help build a world where robotics and AI systems help with people with physical and cognitive work, accelerate scientific discovery, and enable solutions to the grand challenges facing humanity. She is the co-author of the books The Heart and The Chip: Our Bright Future with Robots, and The Mind’s Mirror: Risk and Reward in the Age of AI.
Industry Impact
It is vital that companies prepare towards the future with machines integrating into the fabrics of life, supporting people with cognitive and physical tasks. The applications of this work are to increase the efficiency and applications of transportation, manufacturing, agriculture, construction, monitoring the environment, underwater exploration, smart cities, medicine, and in-home tasks such as cooking.
Daniela Rus' research is to develop the science of networked/distributed/collaborative robotics by addressing the development of algorithms and systems that (1) enable collaboration; (2) couple tightly communication, control, and perception; (3) are scalable and generally independent on the number of agents in the systems; (4) have provable guarantees.
Her work impacts:
Self-Driving Cars
The objective is to develop data-driven customized transportation. Mobility on demand focuses to transform transportation into utility and to be available to anybody at any time. Rus states, “If you want to go somewhere, you book a ride, the robot car comes to where you are and drives you where you want to go.” After being dropped off, the robot car coordinates with the other robots in the system to determine the next pickup location. The optimization engine ensures that passengers’ waiting times, car trajectories, and vehicles in the system are optimized.
Soft Robots
Soft robots build the gap between machines and people. In comparison to hard bodied robots, soft robots have a continuously deformable structure with muscle-like actuation that can deform and absorb much of the energy arising from a collision. It promises to 1) Bend and twist with high curvatures in confined spaces; 2) Deform bodies that replicate motions that emulate biology; 3)Adapt shape to environment in efforts to manipulate un-modeled objects; 4) Execute rapid and agile maneuvers like fish.