Uploaded October 2025 | Updated September 2026, 2 weeks ago
https://www.ri.cmu.edu/event/bringing-dexterity-to-robot-hands-in-the-real-world/
Nancy Pollard
Professor
Robotics Institute,
Carnegie Mellon University
October 24, 2025
Bringing Dexterity to Robot Hands in the Real World
Abstract: Dexterous manipulation is a grand challenge of robotics, and fine manipulation skills are required for many robotics applications that we envision. In this overview talk, I will discuss my view of some major factors that contribute to dexterity and discuss how we can incorporate them into our robots and systems.
Bio: Nancy Pollard is a Professor in the Robotics Institute and the Computer Science Department at Carnegie Mellon University. She received her PhD in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science from the MIT Artificial Intelligence Laboratory, where she developed grasp and manipulation planning algorithms for the Stanford/JPL and Utah/MIT dexterous hands. Prof. Pollard spent the next few decades studying human and robot dexterity, with emphasis on bringing human manipulation strategies with performance guarantees to humanoid robots with dexterous hands. She received the NSF CAREER award for research on “Quantifying Humanlike Enveloping Grasps”, the Okawa Research Grant for “Studies of Dexterity for Computer Graphics and Robotics,” and was a recent recipient of an NSF Convergence Accelerator award for “Bio-Inspired Design of Robot Hands for Use-Driven Dexterity.” She has led the development of several generations of dexterous soft robotic hands, is a founder of FuturHand Robotics and leads the CMU Foam Hands Laboratory.
https://www.ri.cmu.edu/event/bringing-dexterity-to-robot-hands-in-the-real-world/
Nancy Pollard
Professor
Robotics Institute,
Carnegie Mellon University
October 24, 2025
Bringing Dexterity to Robot Hands in the Real World
Abstract: Dexterous manipulation is a grand challenge of robotics, and fine manipulation skills are required for many robotics applications that we envision. In this overview talk, I will discuss my view of some major factors that contribute to dexterity and discuss how we can incorporate them into our robots and systems.
Bio: Nancy Pollard is a Professor in the Robotics Institute and the Computer Science Department at Carnegie Mellon University. She received her PhD in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science from the MIT Artificial Intelligence Laboratory, where she developed grasp and manipulation planning algorithms for the Stanford/JPL and Utah/MIT dexterous hands. Prof. Pollard spent the next few decades studying human and robot dexterity, with emphasis on bringing human manipulation strategies with performance guarantees to humanoid robots with dexterous hands. She received the NSF CAREER award for research on “Quantifying Humanlike Enveloping Grasps”, the Okawa Research Grant for “Studies of Dexterity for Computer Graphics and Robotics,” and was a recent recipient of an NSF Convergence Accelerator award for “Bio-Inspired Design of Robot Hands for Use-Driven Dexterity.” She has led the development of several generations of dexterous soft robotic hands, is a founder of FuturHand Robotics and leads the CMU Foam Hands Laboratory.
