Bruno Siciliano (engineer)

Bruno Siciliano (Naples, 27 October 1959) is an Italian engineer, academic and scientific popularizer. Full professor of Automatic Control at the University of Naples Federico II, Director of the ICAROS Center, Coordinator of the PRISMA Lab at the Department of Electrical Engineering and Information Technologies, he is also Honorary Professor at the University of Óbuda where he holds the Rudolf Kálmán chair.

Bruno Siciliano during his presentation "Robotics for Industry 4.0" held at the international conference "Robotex: Generation R" in Tallinn on 30 November 2018.

Biography

Academic profile

In 1982 he graduated in Electronic Engineering from the University of Naples Federico II where he then obtained a PhD in Electronic and Computer Engineering in 1987. Fascinated by the readings of Isaac Asimov's books on science fiction and cybernetics, he decides to approach what at the time were only the beginnings of robotics in terms of research. From September 1985 to June 1986 he was visiting scholar at the George W. Woodruff School of Mechanical Engineering of the Georgia Institute of Technology where he was interested in the problems of modeling and control of flexible robots. He becomes Assistant Professor of Automatic Control in 1989 at the Department of Computer and Systems Engineering of the University of Naples and then Associate Professor in 1992. He moves to the role of Full Professor in 2000 for the Department of Electronic and Computer Engineering of the University of Salerno. Since 2003 he has been Full Professor of Automatic Control at the Department of Computer and Systems Engineering, which has later become the Department of Electrical Engineering and Information Technologies.

Since 2016 he has been Honorary Professor of the University of Óbuda from which he has received the chair named after Rudolf Emil Kálmán in 2019.

Research activities

His research activities concern the manipulation and control of robots, cooperation between robots and humans and service robotics. He directs ICAROS, the Interdepartmental Center for Robotic Surgery which aims to create synergies between clinical and surgical practice and research on new technologies for computer/robot assisted surgery. He coordinates PRISMA Lab, the Laboratory of Projects of Industrial and Service Robotics, Mechatronics and Automation, known in the scientific community for its significant results in industrial, cooperative, aerial, medical, cognitive and service robotics and which operates in the Department of Electrical Engineering and Information Technology (DIETI) of the University of Naples Federico II. He is a member of the Board of Directors of the Research Consortium for Energy, Automation and Electromagnetic Technologies (CREATE) where he is responsible for the research program in Robotics and with which since 2013 he has participated in several European projects.

Among the research projects we highlight RoDyMan (Robotic Dynamic Manipulation, 2013-2019) a robot capable of replicating the movements of the pizza maker – in terms of scientific research, it represented the challenge of creating an automaton capable of manipulating deformable and elastic objects, as the mixture of water and flour can be. With RoDyMan he obtained an Advanced Grant, a frontier research grant from the European Research Council. Siciliano has been the coordinator of several projects funded by the European Commission: REFILLS (Robotics Enabling Fully-Integrated Logistics Lines for Supermarkets, 2017-2020) a project aimed at the realization of mobile assistance cobots in supermarkets, EuRoC (European Robotics Challenges, 2014–2018) the largest research program in Europe on robotic competitions which from 2014 to 2018 distributed a budget of € 7 million to 15 team challengers , DEXMART (DEXterous and Autonomous Dual-Arm / Hand Robotic Manipulation with sMART Sensory-Motor Skills: A Bridge from Natural to Artificial Cognition, 2008–2012) one of the first European projects on bimanual manipulation; he also co-coordinated ECHORD (European Clearing House for Open Robotics Development, 2009–2013) a pilot project for technology transfer from research laboratories to SMEs. In addition, he has received various other funds for projects financed by MIUR, CNR, ASI, the Campania Region and other entities. Among these, he is scientific manager of the ICT for Health project (2018-2022) for a five-year development program related to health technologies funded by MIUR at DIETI as part of the national MIUR Department of Excellence program.

Scientific contributions

Publications

In addition to the publication of hundreds of articles in scientific journals and conference proceedings, he is the author of several robotics texts and manuals.

In 2008 with Oussama Khatib of Stanford University he published the Springer Handbook of Robotics (ISBN 9783540239574), which received the PROSE Award from the American Association of Publishers for Excellence in Physical Sciences & Mathematics, and it also the winner for the Engineering & Technology category. A text that is the result of the coordination work of over 200 world-renowned researchers with the aim of combining the manual dimension with the encyclopedic one. With the second edition of 2016 (ISBN 9783319325521) the book was among the first to have a multimedia support for direct viewing of videos within the text.

In 2009 with Lorenzo Sciavicco, Luigi Villani and Giuseppe Oriolo he published Robotics, Modeling, Planning and Control (ISBN 9781846286421), a textbook by Springer now in its third edition and translated into Chinese (ISBN 9787560557847), Greek (ISBN 9789603307488) and Italian (ISBN 9788838663222).

Dissemination

"Keep the gradient" is the motto that Siciliano invented and means the constant search for new ideas and new solutions: a hymn to complexity to seize challenges and opportunities always under the banner of the art of "work and play" as he stated in his TEDx talk in 2016.

He has given plenary talks for more than 30 international conferences, as well as seminars at more than 150 institutions around the world.

He was President of the IEEE Robotics and Automation Society from 2008 to 2009. Since 2013 he has been a member of the Board of Directors of the European Robotics Association , the association responsible for creating a public-private partnership in the field of robotics in Europe. In 2019 he was among the founding members of the National Institute for Robotics and Intelligent Machines (I-RIM), created to promote the development and use of robotics technologies and intelligent machines to improve the quality of life. He is a member of the I-RIM Board of Directors. Since 2020 he is on the Board of the International Foundation of Robotics Research, the association responsible for promoting scientific excellence in robotics research.

He is active on the MOOC front of the e-learning platform of the University of Naples Federico II with his two Robotics Foundations I& II courses associated with the contents of his textbook, also available on the edX platform, and participation in Industry 4.0 courses , on enabling technologies underlying the new 4.0 paradigm and Pizza Revolution for research and studies on robotics applied to the art of making pizza.

Awards

Among the international awards, in addition to the honorary chair in Budapest and the PROSE Award mentioned above, the IEEE RAS George Saridis Leadership Award in Robotics and Automation "for his outstanding leadership in the robotics and automation community as a research innovator, an inspired educator, a dedicated contributor of professional service, an ambassador of science and technology" (2015), the IEEE RAS Distinguished Service Award" for outstanding leadership and commitment in promoting robotics and automation and RAS as the number one Society in the field" (2010). Among the national ones, the Guido Dorso Award for the University section (2015) and the IPE Alumni Award (2008).

It ranks tenth (second among engineers) on the list of the 90 most influential scientists of the University of Naples Federico II in the world.

Private life

Bruno Siciliano is married, has two sons and a daughter. He is a passionate Napoli fan which he follows in numerous away matches in Italy and abroad as well as in all the matches at the San Paolo stadium. He is also an admirer of rock music, gourmet food and fine wines.

Bibliography

• (EN) From Pizza Making to Human Care, Springer Nature storytelling project "Before the Abstract", 10 July 2018
• (IT) Conferimento del Premio Guido Dorso, Palazzo Giustiniani, Roma, 15 October 2015
• (EN) Oral Histories: Bruno Siciliano, Robotics History: Narratives and Networks, IEEE TV, 4 May 2015
• Pietro Greco, I nipoti di Galileo, Baldini Castoldi Dalai Editore, ISBN 978-88-6620-071-0, 2011
• (EN) In the Spotlight: Prof. Bruno Siciliano, Springer Author Zone, January 2011

Related items

• Springer Handbook of Robotics

External links

• Google Scholar Profile