DeMaMech: EU-Japan Collaboration in Higher Education Student Exchange Program

Offer of Research Topic

Offer from	University	Osaka University
	Faculty/Department/Institute	Department of Adaptive Machine Systems, Graduate School of Engineering
	Group Name	Intelligent Robotics Laboratory
Research Theme		Generating natural motion in an android by synchronizing with its utterance.
Brief Explanation		One of the main aims of humanoid robotics is to develop robots that are capable of interacting naturally with people. But to understand the essence of human interaction, it is crucial to investigate the contribution of behavior and appearance. Our group's research explores their relationship by developing androids that closely resemble human beings in both aspects, and we have many research topics. One of them is to investigate how to generation natural motion in the android. One clue is motion synchronization with utterance. People sometimes show the motion synchronized with their utterance unconsciously. The simple evidence is nodding at the end of utterance. These unconscious motions must make the android motion more natural. In this program you analyze people’s conversations using a motion capture system. You explore the relationship between people’s motion and their utterance and create a motion generation method. Finally you implement the method in the android.
Research Steps		1. Analyzing people’s conversation and learning Microsoft Visual C++ (three months). 2. Creating the motion generation method using the above results (two months). 3. Implementing the method in the android (two months). 4. Evaluating the naturalness of the android motion generated by the method (three month).
Period		10 months.
Necessary Background, Knowledge, Skills		Pattern recognition. Statistics. Computer programming skills (Microsoft Visual C++ is desirable).
Further Information		http://www.ed.ams.eng.osaka-u.ac.jp
Contact Person		Prof. Dr. Hiroshi Ishiguro (ishiguro@ams.eng.osaka-u.ac.jp)