Robotics

Robots are already screwing devices together, taking on complex thinking and caring for people: robots have become an integral part of today's world. Most of the robots do their work in factories. Nevertheless, there are a variety of other devices that are also considered robots: For example, autonomous, mobile robots that can carry out explorations or walking robots. There are also household and service robots that function as vacuum cleaners, window cleaners or lawn mowers. Or robots that resemble humans or animals. They should adapt to and interact with people, for example to give them information. Areas of application for these are the care of older and disabled people or the care of children. Artificial intelligence is not only playing an increasingly important role in these social robots, as they are supposed to respond flexibly to human needs. The latest developments therefore focus on the generation and collection of well-founded knowledge and data at the machine level. The machine can learn from its human operators and then improve performance. Almost half of the newly deployed industrial robots should be equipped with at least one intelligent function such as predictive analytics or autonomous perception within the next two years. AI-based collaborative robots (cobots) will become increasingly important in the future to create healthy and safe living and working conditions that are less harmful to the environment and achieve more sustainable working conditions in factories. It is predicted that the market for consumer robots will double. The next generation of AI-based robots will focus less on physical tasks and more on teaching and interacting with family members.

* Planned start: WS 2020/21 - subject to approval by the Bavarian State Ministry for Science and Art.