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Robotics call for proposals

Pursuing the future of robotics research

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About this CFP

Amazon is advancing the robotics technology in many application areas. Amazon Robotics designs, codes, builds, and manufactures game-changing software applications, control systems, robotics and related hardware that is revolutionizing Amazon's operations across the globe. AWS RoboMaker provides the most complete cloud solution for robotic developers to simulate, test and securely deploy robotic applications at scale.
We welcome proposals in these research topics related to robotics:

  • Human-Robot Interaction (HRI) - including human machine interaction and collaboration, learning from human preferences, affective and social interactions, and ergonomic or cognitive load support;
  • Autonomous Navigation and Mobility - including field robotics, SLAM, long-term autonomy, trajectory planning, autonomous calibration, methods for ground and aerial applications, sim-to-real transfer, real-to-sim digital twin creation, sensor simulators, wireless communication, localization systems, proximity sensors, and low power devices;
  • Manipulation - including grasping, dexterous manipulation, gripper design, motion and grasp planning, tactile sensing, compliant control, manipulation learning, assembly, multi-step task planning, sim-to-real transfer, real-to-sim digital twin creation, simulation of deformable objects, and sensor simulators;
  • Multi-robot systems - including multi-agent pathfinding, task assignment, planning and scheduling, distributed algorithms, and multi-agent reinforcement learning;
  • Artificial Intelligence for Robotics - including computer vision, semantic scene understanding, pose estimation, object tracking, multi-modal sensing, calibration-less operation, few-shot learning, reinforcement learning for robotics, sample-efficiency, deep learning, and hierarchical RL.

Theoretical advances, creative new ideas, and practical applications are all welcome.

Timeline

The submission period has closed.
Decision letters will be sent out early 2021.

Award details

Selected Principal Investigators (PIs) may receive the following:

  • Unrestricted funds, no more than $80,000 USD on average
  • AWS Promotional Credits, no more than $20,000 USD on average
  • Training resources, including AWS tutorials and hands-on sessions with Amazon scientists and engineers

Awards are structured as one-year unrestricted gifts. The budget should include a list of expected costs specified in USD, and should not include administrative overhead costs. The final award amount will be determined by the awards panel.

Eligibility requirements

Please refer to the ARA Program rules on the FAQ page.

Proposal requirements

Proposals should be prepared according to the proposal template. To submit a proposal for this CFP, please also indicate your research topic(s) as outlined in the “About this CFP” section, and list the open-source tools you plan to contribute to, and/or any AWS tools you may use.

Please note when submitting a proposal, you will be asked to select a subcategory from these five options: Manipulation, Mobility, Human Robot Interaction, Artificial Intelligence for Robotics, and Multi-robot Systems.

Selection criteria

ARA will make the funding decisions based on the potential impact to the research community and quality of the scientific content.

Expectations from recipients

Recipients are assigned an Amazon research contact who offers consultation and advice along with opportunities to participate in Amazon events and training sessions. To the extent deemed reasonable, Award recipients should acknowledge the support from ARA. Award recipients will inform ARA of publications, presentations, code and data releases, blogs/social media posts, and other speaking engagements referencing the results of the supported research or the Award. Award recipients are expected to provide updates and feedback to ARA via surveys or reports on the status of their research. Award recipients are encouraged to attend (physically or virtually) our Robotics Research Symposium in fall 2021 to present the results of their research. Award recipients will have an opportunity to work with ARA on an informational statement about the awarded project that may be used to generate visibility for their institutions and ARA.

Additional Information

This CFP is funded annually.

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