The Institute of Robotics and Cognitive Systems at the University of Lübeck has a vacancy for an Assistant Professorship (Juniorprofessur) Tenure Track W2 for Robotics for an initial period of three years with an option to extend for a further three years. The future holder of the position should represent the field of robotics in research and teaching. Furthermore, the holder of the professorship shall establish their own working group at the Institute of Robotics and Cognitive Systems. The future holder of the position should have a very good doctorate and demonstrable scientific experience in one or more of the following research areas: Modelling, simulation, and control of robots, Robot kinematics and dynamics, Robot sensor technology, e.g., force and moment sensor technology, Robotic systems, e.g., telerobotic systems, humanoid robots, etc., Soft robotics and continuum robotics, AI and machine learning methods in robotics, Human-robot collaboration and safe autonomous robot systems, AR/VR in robotics, Applications of AI and robotics in medicine. The range of tasks also includes the acquisition of third-party funds and the assumption of project management. The applicant is expected to be scientifically involved in the research focus areas of the institute and the profile areas of the university, especially in the context of projects acquired by the institute itself (public funding, industrial cooperations, etc.). The position holder is expected to be willing to cooperate with the “Lübeck Innovation Hub for Robotic Surgery” (LIROS), the 'Center for Doctoral Studies Lübeck' and the 'Open Lab for Robotics and Imaging in Industry and Medicine' (OLRIM). In teaching, participation in the degree programme 'Robotics and Autonomous Systems' (German-language Bachelor’s, English-language Master’s) as well as the other degree programmes of the university’s STEM sections is expected.

Neurotrophins (NGF, BDNF, NT-3) are endogenous growth factors that exert neuroprotective effects by preventing neuronal death and promoting neurogenesis. They act by binding to their respective high-affinity, pro-survival receptors TrkA, TrkB or TrkC, as well as to p75NTR death receptor. While these molecules have been shown to significantly slow or prevent neurodegeneration, their reduced bioavailability and inability to penetrate the blood-brain-barrier limit their use as potential therapeutics. To bypass these limitations, our research team has developed and patented small-sized, lipophilic compounds which selectively resemble neurotrophins’ effects, presenting preferable pharmacological properties and promoting neuroprotection and repair against neurodegeneration. In addition, the combination of these molecules with 3D cultured human neuronal cells, and their targeted delivery in the brain ventricles through soft robotic systems, could offer novel therapeutic approaches against neurodegenerative diseases and brain trauma.

While classical industrial robots are mostly designed for repetitive tasks, assistive robots will be challenged by a variety of different tasks in close contact with humans. Hereby, learning through the direct interaction with humans provides a potentially powerful tool for an assistive robot to acquire new skills and to incorporate prior human knowledge during the exploration of novel tasks. Moreover, an intuitive interactive teaching process may allow non-programming experts to contribute to robotic skill learning and may help to increase acceptance of robotic systems in shared workspaces and everyday life. In this talk, I will discuss recent research I did on interactive robot skill learning and the remaining challenges on the route to human-centered teaching of assistive robots. In particular, I will also discuss potential connections and overlap with cognitive science. The presented work covers learning a library of probabilistic movement primitives from human demonstrations, intention aware adaptation of learned skills in shared workspaces, and multi-channel interactive reinforcement learning for sequential tasks.

In this talk I present the perspectives of the "neuropunk revolution'' technologies. One could understand the "neuropunk revolution'' as the integration of real-time neurosimulations into biological nervous/motor systems via neurostimulation or artificial robotic systems via integration with actuators. I see the added value of the real-time neurosimulations as bridge technology for the set of developed technologies: BCI, neuroprosthetics, AI, robotics to provide bio-compatible integration into biological or artificial limbs. Here I present the three types of integration of the "neuropunk revolution'' technologies as inbound, outbound and closed-loop in-outbound systems. I see the shift of the perspective of how we see now the set of technologies including AI, BCI, neuroprosthetics and robotics due to the proposed concept for example the integration of external to a body simulated part of the nervous system back into the biological nervous system or muscles.