Prof. Paul Y. Oh
Department of Mechanical Engineering
Drexel University
Philadelphia, PA
Robotics is going through a renaissance and is attracting strong academic, industrial, agency
and public support both in the US and abroad. Since the 1950s, each generation of
Americans has envisioned robot companions that will improve the quality of life. In the past
five decades, robots have advanced, but have not lived up to expectations. Today's
unprecedented convergence of technologies makes the near-term outlook very promising.
The integration of mechatronics, computational power and artificial intelligence has resulted
in life-like humanoids, autonomous vehicles and planetary rovers. Robotics is on the verge of
a tipping point that will positively impact our lives. Through personal reflection, this talk will
explore factors that have helped to yield transformative research in unmanned aerial vehicles
(UAVs) and humanoids. Factors to be discussed include industry partnerships, international
collaborations and working with stakeholders outside academia.
Biosketch
Prof. Paul Oh is an ASME Fellow and interim Department Head at
Prof. Paul Oh is an ASME Fellow and interim Department Head at
Drexel's Mechanical Engineering Department. He received mechanical
engineering degrees from McGill (B.Eng 1989), Seoul National (M.Sc
1992), and Columbia (PhD 1999). Honors include faculty fellowships at
NASA Jet Propulsion Lab (2002), Naval Research Lab (2003), the NSF
CAREER award (2004), the SAE Ralph Teetor Award for Engineering
Education Excellence (2005) and being named a Boeing Welliver Fellow
(2006). He is the Director of the Drexel Autonomous Systems Lab and
also the Founding Chair of the IEEE Technical Committee on Aerial
Robotics and UAVs. From 2008-2010, he served at the National
Science Foundation (NSF) as the Program Director managing the
robotics research portfolio.