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
An End-to-End Framework for Modeling Pneumatic Soft Robots Based on Differentiable Finite Element Methods
Zhong S, Yao Y, Maiolino P & Posner I (2025), IEEE Robotics and Automation Letters, 10(12), 13003-13010
BibTeX
@article{anendtoendframe-2025/12,
title={An End-to-End Framework for Modeling Pneumatic Soft Robots Based on Differentiable Finite Element Methods},
author={Zhong S, Yao Y, Maiolino P & Posner I},
journal={IEEE Robotics and Automation Letters},
volume={10},
pages={13003-13010},
publisher={Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE)},
year = "2025"
}
Touch-to-Touch Translation - Learning the Mapping Between Heterogeneous Tactile Sensing Technologies
Grella F, Albini A, Cannata G & Maiolino P (2025), 00, 1998-2004
BibTeX
@inproceedings{touchtotouchtra-2025/8,
title={Touch-to-Touch Translation - Learning the Mapping Between Heterogeneous Tactile Sensing Technologies},
author={Grella F, Albini A, Cannata G & Maiolino P},
booktitle={2025 IEEE 21st International Conference on Automation Science and Engineering (CASE)},
pages={1998-2004},
year = "2025"
}
Improving Tactile Gesture Recognition with Optical Flow
Zhong S, Albini A, Caroleo G, Cannata G & Maiolino P (2025)
BibTeX
@misc{improvingtactil-2025/8,
title={Improving Tactile Gesture Recognition with Optical Flow},
author={Zhong S, Albini A, Caroleo G, Cannata G & Maiolino P},
year = "2025"
}
Optical Waveguide-based Spider Web Enables Resilient Impact Detection and Localization
Wilson D, Pontin M, Walters P & Maiolino P (2025)
BibTeX
@misc{opticalwaveguid-2025/6,
title={Optical Waveguide-based Spider Web Enables Resilient Impact Detection and Localization},
author={Wilson D, Pontin M, Walters P & Maiolino P},
year = "2025"
}
Diffusion-based Inverse Observation Model for Artificial Skin
Maric A, Jankowski J, Caroleo G, Albini A, Maiolino P et al. (2025)
BibTeX
@misc{diffusionbasedi-2025/6,
title={Diffusion-based Inverse Observation Model for Artificial Skin},
author={Maric A, Jankowski J, Caroleo G, Albini A, Maiolino P et al.},
year = "2025"
}
Compliant Beaded-String Jamming For Variable Stiffness Anthropomorphic Fingers
Westermann M, Pontin M, Costi L, Albini A & Maiolino P (2025), 00, 1-6
BibTeX
@inproceedings{compliantbeaded-2025/4,
title={Compliant Beaded-String Jamming For Variable Stiffness Anthropomorphic Fingers},
author={Westermann M, Pontin M, Costi L, Albini A & Maiolino P},
booktitle={2025 IEEE 8th International Conference on Soft Robotics (RoboSoft)},
pages={1-6},
year = "2025"
}
JAMMit! Monolithic 3D-Printing of a Bead Jamming Soft Pneumatic Arm
Yao Y, Westermann M, Pontin M, Albini A & Maiolino P (2025), 00, 1-6
BibTeX
@inproceedings{jammitmonolithi-2025/4,
title={JAMMit! Monolithic 3D-Printing of a Bead Jamming Soft Pneumatic Arm},
author={Yao Y, Westermann M, Pontin M, Albini A & Maiolino P},
booktitle={2025 IEEE 8th International Conference on Soft Robotics (RoboSoft)},
pages={1-6},
year = "2025"
}
Estimating Scene Flow in Robot Surroundings with Distributed Miniaturized Time-of-Flight Sensors
Sander J, Caroleo G, Albini A & Maiolino P (2025)
BibTeX
@misc{estimatingscene-2025/4,
title={Estimating Scene Flow in Robot Surroundings with Distributed Miniaturized Time-of-Flight Sensors},
author={Sander J, Caroleo G, Albini A & Maiolino P},
year = "2025"
}
Tiny Lidars for Manipulator Self-Awareness: Sensor Characterization and Initial Localization Experiments
Caroleo G, Albini A, De Martini D, Barfoot TD & Maiolino P (2025)
BibTeX
@inproceedings{tinylidarsforma-2025/3,
title={Tiny Lidars for Manipulator Self-Awareness: Sensor Characterization and Initial Localization Experiments},
author={Caroleo G, Albini A, De Martini D, Barfoot TD & Maiolino P},
year = "2025"
}
Mechanics of pressurized cellular sheets
Chandler T, Ferria J, Shorthose O, Allain J-M, Maiolino P et al. (2025), Journal of the Royal Society Interface, 22(223)
BibTeX
@article{mechanicsofpres-2025/2,
title={Mechanics of pressurized cellular sheets},
author={Chandler T, Ferria J, Shorthose O, Allain J-M, Maiolino P et al.},
journal={Journal of the Royal Society Interface},
volume={22},
number={20240653},
publisher={The Royal Society},
year = "2025"
}
