Ruta Desai

I am a Masters student at the Robotics Institute, School of Computer Science, Carnegie Mellon University, since Fall 2011. My current research is in Legged robots, Bio-inspired robots and Technology for disabled people. I work with Prof. Hartmut Geyer and Prof. Chris Atkeson. At CMU, I am part of Quality of Life Technology Center. I completed my Bachelors in 2011 from National Institute of Technology, Surat, in Electronics Engineering.

I am fascinated by how humans do things and learn things, from motor skills to high level cognitive tasks and want to make robots learn and do all these! I am also interested in innovative technologies for education and developing communities.

Apart from robotics and tech, I enjoy hiking, travelling and reading. I get enthusiastic about pretty much any idea on education, DIY, environment conservation and technology.

Resume

Office: 1324, Wean Hall.
Email: rutad AT cmu DOT edu




Recent Activities

  • Volunteering with Women @ SCS : Computer Science via Card Magic tricks! It was a fun Saturday morning where we taught kids things like binary search and parity check for error correction and much more using cards! Check out some tricks here!
  • Education and Outreach Co-ordinator: at Student Leadership Council of Quality of Life Technology Center at CMU.

Current Research

  • Robust Swing Leg Control under Large Disturbances:
    Swing leg placement is vital to dynamic stability in legged robots and animals. The most common approaches to generating swing leg motions in robotics use either position or impedance tracking of defined joint trajectories. While these approaches suffice in humanoids, they severely limit swing leg placement under large disturbances in prosthetic limbs, for which stabilizing reactions cannot be planned centrally. Rather than careful central planning, animals and humans seem to rely on local feedback control for reliable swing leg placement. Motivated by this observation, we are trying to develop an alternative for generating swing leg motions by taking advantage of segment interactions to achieve robust leg placement under large disturbances.

Publications

  • R.Desai, H. Geyer, “Robust Swing Leg Placement under Large Disturbances”, IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Biomimetics, 2012.
  • R Desai, H Geyer. “Muscle-Reflex Control of Robust Swing Leg Placement”, IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation, 2013.

Awards

  • Selected as Siebel Scholar, Class of 2013.
  • Recipient of the Google Anita Borg Memorial Scholarship 2012. See the announcement here,

Posters

  • "Identifying Sensory-Feedback Control of Human Limbs in Swing Motion for Robust Control of Segmented Artificial Legs" in the CRA-W Graduate Cohort 2012,at Bellevue,WA.
  • "Muscle-Reflex Control of Robust Swing Leg Placement for Segmented Artificial Legs" at QoLT Summit,2012 . [PDF]

Relevant Courses

  • Machine Learning.
  • Human Motion Modeling and Analysis.
  • Kinematics, Dynamics and Control.
  • Dynamic Optimization. Check out work done here.
  • Biomechanics and Human Motor Control.
  • Computer Vision.
  • Math Fundamentals for Robotics.

Media

  • Google Anita Borg Profile
  • Siebel Scholar Profile

    Some more news stories: CMU SCS News , Robotics Institute News and college magazine about Siebel Scholars


Last Updated: January, 2013