BrIAS Seminar 9

Date 21.3.2024
Location: AIXC VUB, Brussels

1. Prof. Bettina Wollesen, University of Hamburg, Institute of Human Movement Science, Germany

Title: Cognitive-motor interference while using an exoskeleton

Exoskeletons, which are coupled with selected user’ body regions, increasingly capture various fields of applications in industrial settings. Next to the morphological structure, the support characteristics (e.g., movement- and position-dependent) are highly relevant for precise movements without cognitive-motor interference (simultaneous motor and cognitive task). For a comfortable, healthy, and suitable use of exoskeletons, the human-machine interaction concerning support characteristics is essential. While biomechanical aspects (e.g., muscle activity) have already been investigated, cognitive-motor performance in simple or complex tasks, when using an exoskeleton, is less considered. This talk will give an overview of existing evidence combined with own research results.

2. Prof. Paolo Turrini, Associate Professor, University of Warwick, UK

Title: Designing Artificial Agents that Learn to Act for Social Good

In social dilemmas individuals are faced with the choice of paying a cost to contribute to a common good (cooperate) or simply abstaining from doing so and free ride on the contributions of other people (cheat). Countless models, simulations and experiments with humans, have shown that nothing good is going to come out from leaving individuals to regulate themselves. If we want to ensure socially desirable behaviour, we need to put mechanisms in place that discourage cheating and promote cooperation.

In this talk, I will explore the emergence of cooperation in social dilemmas with the option of opting out, where individuals play a social dilemma in pairs but can also decide whether to continue playing with their current partner or break ties and be randomly assigned to someone else instead. We will observe that this simple mechanism is enough to promote cooperative behaviour even in populations of self-interested individuals.

To this end, I will show that utility-maximising Q-learning agents are able to discover and adopt strategies for partner selection that ostracise selfish agents, completely by themselves. I will then move to experiments conducted with humans on these games, analysing the conditions under which cooperation prevails, and show how a simple Reinforcement Learning algorithm can faithfully simulate the way humans behave.

What I will to present is joint work with Chin-wing Leung, Apurva Shah, Eugene Malthouse, Nobuyuki Hanaki, Charlie Pilgrim and Thomas Hills.


3. Dr. Fatma Demir, Post-Doc, Brubotics, VUB

Title: Towards sustainable research management: Lessons from the SMART Project

Drawing insights from the Project SMART (Soft, Self-responsive, Smart MAterials for RoboTs, www.smartitn.eu), my presentation will frame a practical approach to achieving sustainability in research management. The MSCA SMART-ITN Project, a collaborative initiative between academia and industry, focuses on developing young researchers in the fields of soft robotics and smart materials. Gathering innovative technological breakthroughs, responsible research practices, and interdisciplinary collaborations, the SMART Project is a very good example for the principles of sustainable research management. This talk will aim to border key lessons learned from the SMART Project and provide action strategies and inspiration for researchers to foster sustainability in their research management in diverse scientific domains.