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GRASP Seminar Series: Spring 2005
March 4, 11:00 AM, Levine Hall 307.
Tucker Balch
College of Computing, Georgia Institute of Technology
Applying Robotics to Biology: Tracking, Analyzing and Modeling the Behavior of Social Animals
Abstract: In the BioTracking Project at Georgia Tech, we have applied techniques that originated in robotics to the task of understanding social animal systems. In particular: we have developed new computer vision algorithms that can track dozens of interacting animals simultaneously; we use Markov modeling techniques to recognize social behavior; and we use behavior based controllers to build executable models of animal behavior based on observation. We have applied our research to the study of live ant and bee colonies in our lab and monkeys at the Yerkes Primate Research Center. This is joint work with Prof Kim Wallen (Emory), Prof Frank Dellaert, Zia Khan, Rebecca Herman, Hank Wilde, Adam Feldman, Stephen Cullpepper and Jesse Scherer.
Biography: Tucker Balch is an assistant professor in the College of Computing at Georgia Tech. He completed his Ph.D. at Georgia Tech in 1998, Balch was a postdoctoral fellow for one year, then a member of the research faculty at CMU for two years before he returned to Georgia Tech in 2001. He now directs the BORG Lab with Frank Dellaert in the College of Computing. His research interests include collaboration and communication in multi-robot teams, and social animal behavior. Professor Balch has published over 70 research articles and edited two books, including "Robot Teams" with Lynne Parker. He likes boiled peanuts, is an NSF CAREER Award recipient and a former F-15 pilot. He has 2.5 children with his wife Maria who teaches computer science at the University of Georgia
