To celebrate the University’s research successes, the University of Hull is offering one UK/EU PhD Scholarship, or International Fees Bursary, for candidates with a 1^st, 2(i), or equivalent, applying for the following project

Closing date 11th January 2013.

Studentships will start in September 2013

Supervisors: <Prof. Ping Jiang and Dr. Darryl N Davis>  p.jiang@hull.ac.uk <01482 465680) <Computer Science>

The ageing society has a strong need to improve mobility and manipulability of ageing people in their living environment. The increasing complexity to achieve autonomous navigation and manipulation makes the current techniques hard to be applied widely in their day-to-day life. Autonomous robots are usually equipped with on-board sensors to perceive the surrounding and to make centralised decision. This centralised intelligence approach brings three major problems: (a) the sensor processing is not robust enough in a real-world environment; (b) the processing algorithms are computationally expensive for working in a dynamic environment; (c) interpretation of scene is difficult in an unstructured environment. In order to overcome these difficulties, this project will provide pervasive intelligence to things in the environment. The project will investigate the key techniques for a robot to effectively work in such an intelligent environment.

1) New intelligent fusion methods will be investigated to integrate the on-board intelligence with the pervasive intelligence for robot context-aware servoing control.

2) Intelligent optimisation methods will be investigated for robot task planning with semantic context embedded in things.

3) A practical demonstrator will be developed for the purpose of methodology research and evaluation. The demonstrator will be a wheelchair to assist living of the elderly in an intelligent environment. The wheelchair will have limited on-board intelligence but can access the pervasive intelligence via wireless communication. 

With pervasive intelligence in an environment, uncertainties faced by a robot can be greatly reduced. It can be envisaged that a robot with less on-board intelligence can exhibit sophisticated mobility and manipulability.

To apply for this post please click ‘Apply Online’ below.

A full-time UK/EU PhD Scholarship will include fees at the ‘home/EU’ student rate and maintenance (£13,590 in 2013/14, subject to final confirmation) for three years, depending on satisfactory progress.

Full-time International Fee PhD Studentships will include full fees at the International student rate for three years, dependant on satisfactory progress, but with no living expenses.

PhD students at the University of Hull follow modules for research and transferable skills development and gain a Masters level Certificate, or Diploma, in Research Training, in addition to their research degree.

Successful applicants will be informed of the award by 29^th March 2013.