I'm a junior students majoring in Automatic Controlling, and now applying for Robotics Master degree.
I'm now really wondering what are the hot topics in robotics, and what i'll do in the future if I get the Robotics Master.
I've asked some professor, and some of them point out the humanoid robots are the hottest topic now. But I want to know more, because I don't really think all of us should do research in humanoid robots.
Can you share your opinions about this? Thank you for your time~~~
The SARCOS group has gotten pretty sophisticated with their manipulators, so I think most of the controls issues have been solved. The hard parts are now portable power (they're now usually tethered), and artificial intelligence (they're now usually human-guided). Another area that needs some work is sensor fusion. And, of course, bringing costs down so hobbyists and garage startups can show their genius as well.
Robotics is a very broad area. For example, you have received an answer which corresponds to the world of mobile, hopfefully autonomous, robotics that is about to enter our ever day life.
However, industrial robotics contains a lot of issues which were not properly solved yet. Here is just a list:
1- high speed robotics in high accuracy areas such as high speed milling 2- automatic reprogramming of robots in order to cope with true flexibility in terms of the product 3- design of stiff joints 4- design of very fast linear actuators which can reach accelerations of more than 10 g's 5- application of adequate dynamic models in controllers in order to reach high speeds, high accelerations and high accuracies. 6- integration of stereo vision to properly aim at objects 7- integration of robotic arms on non-holonomic mobile vehicles.Of course, the best way to deal with it is to browse through the pages of various Universities and see what they have to offer. Do not restrict yourself to only one country, especially if you know other languages like Italian or French. You should also investigate European and Canadian programs which are very strong.
I hope it helps. Good luck in your search.
LHR
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