Bulletin Spring‧Summer 1999

New Laboratories to Study Robotics and Microsystems A utomation and robotics are new research areas that are rapidly developing at the University. Last year two related laboratories — Advanced Robotics Laboratory and Advanced Microsystems Laboratory — were established under the Department of Mechanical and Automation Engineering. In November the Xiangshan Scientific Symposium on Telescience and Robotics was convened on CUHK campus, drawing together some 40 top scientists and researchers from Hong Kong, mainland China, J a p a n , USA, Russia, and Germany to discuss frontier research in robotics, automation, information and space technology, and to promote international collaboration in these areas. Robots Can Do Almost Anything We Can Do A u t o m a t i o n of D r i v i n g One day if you see a driverless car on the highway, stay calm. This is no longer a scene from a sci-fi film. Prof. Xu Yangsheng, chairman of the Department of Mechanical and Automation Engineering, said he had participated in research on autonomous vehicles back in the early 1990s at Carnegie Mellon University. In 1996 the car they produced drove itself for the first time all the way from Washington D.C. on the East coast to San Diego in California. One of the research focuses of the Advanced Robotics Laboratory which Prof . Xu heads is how to model human intelligence and use this model to replace human intelligence in control strategies, such as driving. What exactly is 'modelling human intelligence'? Prof. Xu explained that it is the At the opening of the Xiangshan Scientific Symposium: (front row from right) Prof. Kenneth Young, CUHK Pro-Vice-Chancellor; Prof. Zhang Kan, Director of International Cooperation, Chinese Academy of Sciences; Prof. Arthur K.C. Li, CUHK Vice-Chancellor; Mr. Wang Feng Chao, Deputy Director of Xinhua News Agency —Hong Kong Branch; Prof. Zhang Tao, Director of Xiangshan Scientific Symposium; Prof. P.C. Ching, CUHK Dean of Engineering; Prof. Xu Yangsheng. New Laboratories to Study Robotics and Microsystems 33