‘Self-determining’ robots gain EU funding
A new generation of self-determining robots able to set their own goals and mimic the human learning process are under development as part of an EU-funded project led by Italian scientists.
The GOAL (Goal-based Open-ended Autonomous Learning) robots will learn and develop skills in a similar way to children and will go on to ‘self-generate’ goals.
Around €3.4m has been allocated by the EU under the FET Open research projects initiative for the development of the robots, which launched this month (November).
The programme is being led by the Laboratory of Computational Embodied Neuroscience (LOCEN), a research group based in Rome at the Institute of Cognitive Sciences and Technologies of the Italian National Research Council (ISTC-CNR).
GOAL is also supported by three research groups, two from Germany and one from France.
Project co-ordinator, Gianluca Baldassarre, from the ISTC-CN said: “The goal is to make robots that are able to learn independently, experimenting and making experiences exactly like young children, between one and two years old, and then apply their new acquired skills.”
The independent thinkers will decide on their own goals and will not be influenced by the research team but by their own experiences and curiosity. It’s intended this way of development will allow robots to complete tasks that are currently out of their reach, such as tidying a room.
Baldassarre added: “Future robots, instead, should be able to learn how to truly ‘master’ their environments autonomously … This will allow them, with little additional learning, to change an environment from its current state to a wide range of potential goal states desired by the user.”
The final test for the robot will be to observe a scene of several objects located in containers and shelves on a working plane, and to reproduce that exact scenario after the objects are mixed up.
