In the beginning of March I traveled to Japan for HRI’13 and several lab visits around the country.

Me and my colorful slides at HRI 2013.

While in Tokyo, we visited three labs from University of Tokyo. They have impressive work in humanoid robots.

Humanoid robot that opens doors and pushes carts around.

After HRI, our next stop was Inuyama where the Primate Research Institute (PRI) from University of Kyoto is located. One of the  main research topics at PRI is symbolic representation and working memory in chimpanzees. Ai, the chimpanzee in the picture below, is able to order numerical sequences among other remarkable capabilities.

Ai kissing me goodbye.

On the next day, we continued our journey west towards Kyoto to visit Nishida Lab and ATR’s Intelligent Robotics and Communication Laboratories.

Me and the new version of Robovie.