Maryland Robotics Center Research Symposium 2025

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Dr. Vijay Kumar is the Nemirovsky Family Dean of Penn Engineering at the University of Pennsylvania, where he holds appointments in the Departments of Mechanical Engineering and Applied Mechanics, Computer and Information Science, and Electrical and Systems Engineering. With over three decades of experience at Penn, he has made significant contributions to robotics, cyber-physical systems, and autonomous technology. Dr. Kumar earned his Bachelor of Technology degree from the Indian Institute of Technology, Kanpur, and his Ph.D. from The Ohio State University in 1987.

Dr. Kumar is a recognized leader in robotics and has held various administrative positions at Penn, including serving as the assistant director for robotics and cyber-physical systems at the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (2012–2013). He is the founder of Exyn Technologies, a company spun out of his lab, which focuses on autonomous robotics systems. Dr. Kumar is a Fellow of both the American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME) and the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE).

His extensive contributions to the field of robotics include serving on the editorial boards of top journals such as IEEE Transactions on Robotics and Automation, IEEE Transactions on Automation Science and Engineering, and the ASME Journal of Mechanical Design. He has received numerous prestigious awards, including the 2012 ASME Mechanisms and Robotics Award, the 2014 Engelberger Robotics Award, the 2017 IEEE Robotics and Automation Society George Saridis Leadership Award, and the 2020 IEEE Robotics and Automation Field Award.

A member of the National Academy of Engineering (elected in 2013), the American Philosophical Society (2018), the American Academy of Arts and Sciences (2022), and the National Academy of Inventors (2022), Dr. Kumar's work continues to shape the future of robotics and autonomous systems. He is an inspiring thought leader and innovator, influencing both academia and industry.
 

To be posted.

Dr. Stephanie Gil is an Assistant Professor at the School of Engineering and Applied Sciences (SEAS) at Harvard University, having joined in July 2020. Before her appointment at Harvard, she was an Assistant Professor in the Department of Computer Science at Arizona State University (ASU), within the School of Computing, Informatics, and Decision Systems Engineering (CIDSE). At ASU, she directed the REACT Lab (Robotics, Embedded Autonomy, and Communication Theory Lab).

Dr. Gil completed her dissertation at the Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory (CSAIL) at MIT, where she developed her expertise in robotics and multi-robot systems. Her research focuses on advancing robot-robot and human-robot teamwork, with a particular emphasis on improving communication and coordination within these systems. Specifically, she explores ways to use wireless signals for more efficient communication in multi-robot teams, enhances situational awareness, and secures critical multi-agent algorithms against cybersecurity threats. Additionally, Dr. Gil has worked on exploring the use of brain signals to facilitate communication in human-robot teams.

Her work extends to practical applications such as indoor positioning systems, human-robot collaboration, and improving the security and robustness of robot-robot teams. Dr. Gil has been recognized with a prestigious NSF CAREER Award in 2019 and was named a 2020 Sloan Research Fellow. She has also held a Visiting Assistant Professorship at Stanford University in 2019, collaborating with the Stanford Robotics Lab.

Her research has received widespread media attention, with coverage in outlets such as MIT News, Wired, and Forbes. A video of her thesis work on multi-vehicle networks can be viewed on YouTube under the title "Multi-Vehicle Network with Adaptation."