Biography
Professor Perla Maiolino completed BEng, MEng and PhD in the department of Informatics, Bioengineering, Robotics and Systems Engineering at University of Genova (Italy), where she worked primarily on Technological aspect of tactile sensing and development of Large Area Tactile Sensors for robots. She worked as PostDoc at University of Cambridge where she investigated aspects related to soft sensing and soft robotics.
Perla moved to Oxford in September 2018 as Associate Professor at the Engineering Science Department and member of Oxford Robotics Institute.
Research Interests
Dr Perla Maiolino is interested in providing robots with the sense of touch. It is an essential modality that allows humans to interact with environment and people. it is used in manipulation and grasping of objects, whole body interaction, in exploration and in reactive behaviour (reflexes). Furthermore it is important for assessing contact parameters such as shape, texture, stiffness and temperature of the touched surface, for developing awareness of the body and for automatic responses (grasp force regulation). Sense of touch is also crucial for guiding motor behaviour (e.g, from controlling the body to perceiving the environment, as well as learning about and interacting with it).
New generations of robots are expected to operate in the dynamic and unstructured environment even more in collaboration with humans. Robots operating in these conditions must exhibit advanced forms of interaction with objects and humans requiring novel solutions in human-robot interaction processes. In this respect soft robotic devices are of particular interest to the robotics community because they have advantageous properties such as easy fabrication, low-cost, light weight, high flexibility, etc., but characterising and predicting their behaviour is challenging due to the non-linear nature of the hyper-elastic
material and their internal pressure. In order to control them it is necessary to monitor their kinematics, their interaction forces with objects in the environment and their internal pressure.
For these reasons, Perla's research is focused on the design of new technological solutions for tactile sensors to be integrated on soft robots. These soft tactile sensors will improve tactile based control of soft robots and will allow to investigate aspects such as sensory-motor coordination and how action and perception are coupled in a soft embodiment which are at the base of the effective utilisation of touch sensing for improving cognitive skills of robots.
Research Groups
Recent Publications
SPADA: a toolbox of designing soft pneumatic actuators for shape matching based on surrogate modeling
Yao Y, He L & Maiolino P (2024), Robotics Reports, 2(1)
BibTeX
@article{spadaatoolboxof-2024/1,
title={SPADA: a toolbox of designing soft pneumatic actuators for shape matching based on surrogate modeling},
author={Yao Y, He L & Maiolino P},
journal={Robotics Reports},
volume={2},
number={29},
publisher={Mary Ann Liebert},
year = "2024"
}
Mathematical model and experimental characterization of vertically stacked capacitive tactile sensors
Baldini G, Staiano M, Grella F, Frascio M, Maiolino P et al. (2023), IEEE Sensors Journal, 23(18), 21341-21354
BibTeX
@article{mathematicalmod-2023/8,
title={Mathematical model and experimental characterization of vertically stacked capacitive tactile sensors},
author={Baldini G, Staiano M, Grella F, Frascio M, Maiolino P et al.},
journal={IEEE Sensors Journal},
volume={23},
pages={21341-21354},
publisher={IEEE},
year = "2023"
}
A tactile feedback insertion strategy for peg-in-hole tasks
Gibbons O, Albini A & Maiolino P (2023), Proceedings of the IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA 2023), 10415-10421
BibTeX
@inproceedings{atactilefeedbac-2023/7,
title={A tactile feedback insertion strategy for peg-in-hole tasks},
author={Gibbons O, Albini A & Maiolino P},
booktitle={IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA 2023)},
pages={10415-10421},
year = "2023"
}
EDAMS: an Encoder-Decoder Architecture for Multi-grasp Soft sensing object recognition
Shorthose O, Albini A, Scimeca L, He L & Maiolino P (2023), Proceedings of the 6th IEEE-RAS International Conference on Soft Robotics (RoboSoft 2023) , 00, 1-7
BibTeX
@inproceedings{edamsanencoderd-2023/5,
title={EDAMS: an Encoder-Decoder Architecture for Multi-grasp Soft sensing object recognition},
author={Shorthose O, Albini A, Scimeca L, He L & Maiolino P},
booktitle={6th IEEE-RAS International Conference on Soft Robotics (RoboSoft 2023) },
pages={1-7},
year = "2023"
}
Rubber-Like Soft Lattice Structure for Anti-Ballooning in Fluidic Elastic Soft Robots
He L, Wang S & Maiolino P (2023), ADVANCED ENGINEERING MATERIALS
BibTeX
@article{rubberlikesoftl-2023/,
title={Rubber-Like Soft Lattice Structure for Anti-Ballooning in Fluidic Elastic Soft Robots},
author={He L, Wang S & Maiolino P},
journal={ADVANCED ENGINEERING MATERIALS},
year = "2023"
}
Rubber-Like Soft Lattice Structure for Anti-Ballooning in Fluidic Elastic Soft Robots
He L, Wang S & Maiolino P (2023), ADVANCED ENGINEERING MATERIALS
BibTeX
@article{rubberlikesoftl-2023/,
title={Rubber-Like Soft Lattice Structure for Anti-Ballooning in Fluidic Elastic Soft Robots},
author={He L, Wang S & Maiolino P},
journal={ADVANCED ENGINEERING MATERIALS},
year = "2023"
}
Mathematical Model and Experimental Characterization of Vertically Stacked Capacitive Tactile Sensors
Baldini G, Staiano M, Grella F, Frascio M, Maiolino P et al. (2023), IEEE SENSORS JOURNAL, 23(18), 21341-21354
BibTeX
@article{mathematicalmod-2023/,
title={Mathematical Model and Experimental Characterization of Vertically Stacked Capacitive Tactile Sensors},
author={Baldini G, Staiano M, Grella F, Frascio M, Maiolino P et al.},
journal={IEEE SENSORS JOURNAL},
volume={23},
pages={21341-21354},
year = "2023"
}
A Toolbox for Designing 3D-Printing-Ready Pneumatic Circuits for Controlling Soft Robots
Wang S, He L, Yao Y, Liu C & Maiolino P (2023), ADVANCED INTELLIGENT SYSTEMS
BibTeX
@article{atoolboxfordesi-2023/,
title={A Toolbox for Designing 3D-Printing-Ready Pneumatic Circuits for Controlling Soft Robots},
author={Wang S, He L, Yao Y, Liu C & Maiolino P},
journal={ADVANCED INTELLIGENT SYSTEMS},
year = "2023"
}
A Sensor Placement Benchmarking Method With Principal Component Analysis
Zhong F, He L, Zavatsky A & Maiolino P (2023), IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON INSTRUMENTATION AND MEASUREMENT, 72
BibTeX
@article{asensorplacemen-2023/,
title={A Sensor Placement Benchmarking Method With Principal Component Analysis},
author={Zhong F, He L, Zavatsky A & Maiolino P},
journal={IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON INSTRUMENTATION AND MEASUREMENT},
volume={72},
number={ARTN 4011009},
year = "2023"
}
Touch Technology in Affective Human-, Robot-, and Virtual-Human Interactions: A Survey
Olugbade T, He L, Maiolino P, Heylen D & Bianchi-Berthouze N (2023), PROCEEDINGS OF THE IEEE
BibTeX
@article{touchtechnology-2023/,
title={Touch Technology in Affective Human-, Robot-, and Virtual-Human Interactions: A Survey},
author={Olugbade T, He L, Maiolino P, Heylen D & Bianchi-Berthouze N},
journal={PROCEEDINGS OF THE IEEE},
year = "2023"
}
