Robotics Institute: Robot Education Lab, Carnegie Mellon University
Carnegie Mellon University’s Robotics Institute (RI) was founded in 1979 when two of its professors, Raj Reddy and Angel Jordan, together with Westinghouse Electric Corporation president Tom Turrin, collaborated and opened the institute with the goal of making it the best place on earth to conduct robotic research.
Decades later, the Robotics Institute continues to flourish and has ushered in a new age of thinking robots. During the following years, the institute researchers have been successful in their work on the following, intelligent manufacturing, autonomous vehicles, space robots, medical robots, nano-robots, computer vision and graphics, and anthropomorphic robots, among others.
To ensure its continuing success, the university rapidly expanded, and between 1994 and 2004, several groups and laboratories within the institute proliferated, each being unique to the other. At the same time, they share the same passion, researching on the field of robotics, and compliment the other labs and groups.
One of these laboratories is the Robot Education Laboratory (REL). This lab is a core and major resource, which supports courses and individual projects done at the institute. At the REL, equipment like the manipulators, mobile robots, electronic and mechanical fabrication benches, Lego, etc. form part of the things being used by students and researchers at this lab.
Among its projects include the snakebots. A robot has been designed that simulates a snake, mimicking snake-like movement and motion, de-mining and coverage. This project was spear-headed by Professor Howie Choset, who also is the lab’s director.
