How far are we from making C3P-O and Rosie the Robot reality? In this talk, we'll explore the components of a robot "brain" -- that is, its software -- by looking under the hood of a real humanoid companion robot. We'll explore the latest research towards making robots human-like, especially in the field of using and understanding social and emotional cues, and discover what this research reveals about ourselves as humans.

Dr. Angelica Lim is a computer scientist specializing in artificial intelligence and robotics, with a B.Sc. in Computing Science (specializing in Artificial Intelligence) from Simon Fraser University in Canada. During her Ph.D. at Kyoto University, Japan, she built a new breed of robot emotion system, based on knowledge of human infant development. She has given two TEDx talks and appears regularly in the media for her work on signal processing and entertainment robotics. Her goal is to develop human-inspired models of emotions and intelligence in robots, to help people to better understand robots and how they can assist humans. She was the first employee at Aldebaran Japan working on the new humanoid robot, Pepper. She is presently a software engineer leading the emotion team at Aldebaran Robotics in Paris.

Established in 2002, this lecture is designed to showcase and promote excellence in science journalism. The lecture is sponsored jointly by the Faculty of Science and the School of Journalism.

The lecture is held annually in the winter semester and is free and open to the public. We kindly ask that you RVSP.