Organizers

Kourosh Darvish is a postdoctoral researcher at the Computer Science and Robotics Institute of the University of Toronto (UofT) and a member of the Vector Institute. Before joining UofT in 2022, he was a postdoctoral researcher at the Italian Institute of Technology (IIT). In 2019, he completed his PhD in Bioengineering and Robotics from the University of Genoa, Italy. Previously, he received his B.Sc. and M.Sc. degrees in Aerospace Engineering from K.N. Toosi University of Technology and Sharif University of Technology (Tehran, Iran) in 2012 and 2014,  respectively. His research focuses on robot learning, robotics for scientific discoveries, shared autonomy, and humanoid robotics manipulation, and optimal control. 

Hatem Fakhruldeen  is the intelligent automation theme lead at the Leverhulme Research Centre for Functional Materials Design, University of Liverpool. He holds a PhD in Robotics and Autonomous Systems from the University of Bristol. His research interests are focused on robotic systems’ integration and robotic manipulation in the context of a chemistry laboratory. He has been leading the  main robotics and automation research efforts in the Cooper Group to build various autonomous chemistry workflows. His latest work involves the development of the Autonomous Robotic Chemistry (ARChemist) system architecture, which is a novel robotic system architecture specifically designed for chemistry lab automation and management. Hatem is a passionate roboticist and software developer who is proficient in different programming languages and paradigms. In his free time, he loves to hike, exercise and play video games.

Dennis Knobbe is a senior research associate at the Chair of Robotics and Systems Intelligence (RSI)/Munich Institute of Robotics and Machine Intelligence (MIRMI) at Technical University of Munich (TUM), Germany. In 2016 he was awarded an MSc in electrical engineering and information technology, with a focus on control and systems theory, from the Christian-Albrecht University of Kiel. His research interests are modeling, analysis, and control of complex dynamic systems, optimal and adaptive control, as well as collective intelligence, systems biology, and knowledge discovery in the field of cell biology with the help of intelligent robotic systems and AI.

Florian Shkurti is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Computer Science at the University of Toronto, where he also serves as a Faculty Member at the UofT Robotics Institute, a Faculty Affiliate at the Vector Institute, and a faculty member at the Acceleration Consortium. He leads the Robot Vision and Learning (RVL) lab, focusing on robotics research encompassing machine learning, perception, planning, and control. Florian's research has been applied to environmental monitoring by autonomous robots, visual navigation for autonomous vehicles, and mobile manipulation.

Zhengxue Zhou is a postdoctoral research associate at the University of Liverpool (UoL), where he focuses on the field of AI-powered mobile robot chemists for the discovery of new materials in the Autonomous Chemistry Laboratory. His current research involves the development of vision-based calibration and localization techniques for autonomous chemists. Furthermore, Zhengxue is engaged in the development of Jetson embedded systems, leveraging this powerful computing platform to optimize the performance of mobile robotic systems. His work also extends to the development of environments in Isaac Sim, which facilitates the simulation and testing of robotic systems in virtual scenarios, ensuring robust and efficient real-world applications. Prior to joining UoL, Zhengxue earned his PhD in robotics at Aarhus University, Denmark. During his doctoral studies, he developed an industrial mobile manipulator to automate production tasks in SMEs.