RO-MAN 06: The 15th IEEE International Symposium on Robot and Human Interactive Communication September 6, 2006

Human-Robot Interaction and Communication is a quickly growing research area at the intersection of research fields such as robotics, engineering, psychology, ethology and cognitive science. Significant initiatives are currently underway funded by public, academic, governmental as well as industrial initiatives, exploring and aiming at advancing this research field and opening up novel and challenging applications. Robots moving out of laboratory and manufacturing environments face hard problems of perception, action and cognition. For robots to be accepted as assistants or companions in people's private homes and everyday environments technological solutions do not suffice: The `human in the loop', as the potential customer and user will decide on the ultimate success of a `home robot' as a product. Application areas that heavily involve human contact are a particularly challenging domain.

Human societies have easily assimilated new technologies, such as mobile phones, but it is less clear in which application areas robots will be accepted. Robots as embodied beings, physical, possibly humanoid or android entities that share our living environments and accompany our lives will have a certain degree of autonomy, initiative, cognitive skills and will communicate and interact with people in ways inspired by human-human contact. Interaction and communication of embodied physical robots with humans is multi-modal, and involves deep issues of social intelligence, communication and interaction that have traditionally been studied primarily in psychology and other areas. The design of a robot's behaviour, appearance, and cognitive and social skills is highly challenging, and requires interdisciplinary collaborations across the traditional boundaries of established disciplines.

IEEE RO-MAN 06 provides a forum for an interdisciplinary exchange for researchers dedicated to advancing knowledge in the field of human-robot interaction and communication. Importantly, RO-MAN has traditionally adopted a broad perspective encompassing research issues of human-machine interaction and communication in networked media as well as virtual and augmented tele-presence environments. Submissions are invited from a variety of research areas that can advance our understanding of human-robot interaction and communication, including areas of engineering and information sciences as well as psychology, social sciences, cognitive science and related areas.

The annual RO-MAN International Workshop series originated in 1992, with the first workshop held at Hosei University in Japan. Since then, different Japanese, European and USA institutions have hosted the workshop. In 2006 IEEE RO-MAN is a symposium and will be hosted in United Kingdom by the Adaptive Systems Research Group at University of Hertfordshire. The event will include tutorials, special organized sessions, and distinguished invited keynote speakers.

Official Website: http://ro-man2006.feis.herts.ac.uk/