[agents] Extended deadline: 2nd International Workshop on Adaptive Robotic Ecologies (ARE'13), at AmI 2013

[Mauro Dragone]

================================================================
2nd International Workshop on Adaptive Robotic Ecologies (ARE'13), at AmI 2013
** Deadline extended to September 7, 2013 **
================================================================

We would like to welcome you to participate and contribute to the 2nd
International Workshop on Adaptive Robotic Ecologies (ARE'13), at AmI
2013 : Fourth International Joint Conference on Ambient Intelligence,
Dec 3, 2013 - Dec 5, 2013, Dublin, Ireland.

Robotic ecologies are networks of heterogeneous robotic devices
(sensors, actuators and automated home appliances) pervasively
embedded in everyday environments, where they cooperate in
applications such as Ambient Assisted Living.
Building smart environments out of multiple robotic devices extends
the type of application that can be considered, reduces their
complexity, and enhances the individual values of the devices involved
by enabling new services that cannot be performed by any device by
itself.
While these potentials make robotic ecologies increasingly popular
across the borders between the fields of robotics, sensor networks,
and ambient intelligence, many fundamental research questions remain
open.
One such question is how to provide sensing and actuating services
that are both adaptable and robust. In order to decide the specific
behaviours which, in combination, achieve necessary and meaningful
tasks, robotic ecologies should not be restricted to only those
situations that are envisioned by their designer. For instance, rather
than requiring pre-defined models of both the activities of the user
they try to assist and the services that should be carried out to
assist them, robotic ecologies should be able to pro-actively and
smoothly adapt to subtle changes in the environment and in the habits
and preferences of their user(s).
In addition to adaptability, control mechanisms for robotic ecologies
should be capable of synthesizing robust strategies, in the sense that
these strategies should take into account both a sufficient amount of
exogenous events and the specific capabilities of the devices used to
enact the strategies.

The goal of ARE'13 (http://are13.ucd.ie) is to bring together
state-of-the-art contributions describing solutions that enable
robotic ecologies to be self-learning, self-configuring, and
self-adapting, in order to increase their adaptability, and reduce the
amount of preparation and pre-programming required for their
deployment in real world applications.

The topics of interest include, but are not limited to:

- Algorithms and theories for cooperation and configuration in robotic
ecologies;
- Evaluation of adaptive robotic ecologies;
- Learning techniques to adapt to changes in the environment and in user needs;
- Self-configuration supporting open, heterogeneous and
computationally constrained systems;
- Adaptation for people-centric robotic ecologies, personalization and
user interaction;
- Concrete examples of adaptive robot ecologies to AmI applications;
- Software engineering and integration issues;
- Current efforts in the standardization of interfaces (SW, HW) for
the integration in AmI environments of commercial devices (sensors,
actuators, robots).

PUBLICATION

Proceedings of the workshops will be published by Springer under the
Communications in Computer and Information Science (CCIS) serie
(http://www.springer.com/series/7899). All accepted contributions will
also be published on the workshop webpage.


CALL FOR CONTRIBUTIONS

Papers are solicited from different research areas, including ambient
intelligence, robotics, wireless sensor networks, and agent systems.
Contributions will be reviewed for quality and relevance to the
workshop’s theme and should present substantial novel research
achievements. Theoretical and applied papers, as well as papers that
capture best practices, requirement analysis for adaptive robotic
ecologies and smart robotic environments,  and lessons learned from
field studies and EU projects are encouraged.
Papers presenting preliminary results may be accepted in the form of
extended abstracts.

SUBMISSION PROCESS

Papers should be up to 14 pages in the CCIS one-column page format,
and should be submitted in pdf format through EasyChair
(https://www.easychair.org/account/signin.cgi?conf=are2013)
Authors should apply Springer conference paper templates, which can be
found in the author’s instruction page
(http://www.springer.com/computer/lncs?SGWID=0-164-6-793341-0)
Submitting a contribution is not a prerequisite to participation in
the workshop and the discussion sessions.


SCHEDULE

*NEW* Submission deadline: September 7, 2013
*NEW* Notification of acceptance: September 30, 2013
*NEW* Camera ready deadline: October 7, 2013
Workshop date: December 3, 2013


ORGANIZERS

This workshop is organized under the auspices of the RUBICON project
(http://fp7rubicon.eu), which is funded by the European Union Seventh
Framework Programme (FP7/2007-2013, ICT-2009.2.1) under grant
agreement No.269914.

* Mauro Dragone,
University College Dublin (UCD), Dublin, Ireland

* Alessandro Saffiotti
AASS Cognitive Robotic Systems Laboratory, University of Orebro, Sweden

* Arantxa Renteria
Health and Quality of Life, Tecnalia, Bilbao, Spain

* Stefano Chessa
Computer Science Department, University of Pisa, Italy


ADDITIONAL INFORMATION

Up-to-date information about this Workshop are posted on the web site:
http://are13.ucd.ie