Support for a Conference on Rehabilitation Robotics

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DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): The purpose of this R13 application is to request support for a 2.5-day meeting that will provide a forum for the exchange of information between investigators who study robotics applied to rehabilitation. The meeting, entitled "New Frontiers in the Human-Machine Interface", will be held at the Northwestern University (NU) Chicago campus, with which the Rehabilitation Institute of Chicago (RIC) is affiliated, on June 28-July 1, 2005. We expect that the meeting will provide an opportunity to review current knowledge, to identify critical gaps in existing knowledge, and to formulate a research agenda that can address these issues. Scientifically, the field of rehabilitation robotics is on the verge of new frontiers in the areas of therapeutic robotics, the brain-machine interface, and the advent of electromechanical devices specially designed for contact with humans. The meeting will involve about 275 participants, including three invited keynote speakers, 26 invited speakers (9 of whom are women), approximately 100 trainees (graduate students and post-doctoral fellows), and a number of investigators in the field. One invited keynote speaker has already agreed to participate in the meeting. The meeting format will consist of three 45-minute keynote addresses (one per day, 30 minute), 40 podium presentations (15 minutes each, 16 per day), 2 poster sessions, and time for discussion at the end of each session. The meeting will encourage the participation of young investigators, women, minorities, and the disabled by reserving space for 8 travel awards reserved for representatives of these groups (two each). Furthermore, the conference has traditionally placed a high value on practical demonstrations of real robotic systems. To encourage this activity, the conference will provide 4 additional travel awards for users of technology to attend the conference, along with provide $800 stipends for researchers to ship equipment to the conference. The IEEE Robotics and Automation Society, in conjunction with the Committee for Medical Robotics, will cosponsor the conference, thereby providing years of organizational experience as well as a conduit for publicity. Consequently, the 4-6-page submitted papers will eventually be placed on IEEE Explore, a highly publicized website.