The "Research Institute for Cognition and Robotics - CoR-Lab"
What are the basic building blocks of cognition and learning? How can we endow robots with some social competence, to make them acceptable as assistents to humans? How can machines communicate smoothly and on semantic levels with humans? Such important yet unsolved key questions have been guiding Bielefeld researchers in the key area of „intelligent systems“ for many years.
In order to face the enormous challenges implied by such question for robotics, the „Research Institute for Cognition and Robotics (CoR-Lab)“ was founded at the Bielefeld University in July 2007 under main participation of the research groups in Neuroinformatics (Prof. H. Ritter, PD Dr. J. Steil) and Applied Computer Science (Prof. G. Sagerer), who are widely known for their work in artifical cognition, computer vision, neural networks, and robot learning.
The new central scientific institute is supported
by the ministry of Innovation, Science, Research 
and Technology, North Rhine-Westphalia and forms
a strategic partnership with the industrial partner Honda Research Institute Europe GmbH (HRI-EU), headed by Prof. Dr.-Ing. habil E. Körner. HRI-EU contributes support for PhD students in joint projects as well as two ASIMO robots, which can be used
within the CoR-Lab as a research platform.
The aim of CoR-Lab is to establish a center in an important field of high-technology in the region Ostwestfalen-Lippe. It is meant both to support the domestic medium-sized economy and to strengthen Bielefeld University in its main focus area „intelligent systems“.
News
Premiere: CoR-Lab and CITEC at Automatica 2010
Bielefeld University participated at the 4th International Trade Fair for Automation and Mechatronics in Munich for the first time. Both CoR-Lab and CITEC presented many different exhibits of the cutting edge field Interactive Intelligent Systems to an international public at their stands in Hall A2. Their stands' features included the vitual agent VINCE, the anthropromorphic robot head Flobi, Bielefeld's mobile robot platform BIRON and the new CoR-Lab project FlexIRob.
On the last day of the fair two groups of school students from Germany caught up on the education at the technical faculty at Bielefeld University.
Interactive Intelligent Systems of Bielefeld University at Hannover Messe 2010
19. - 23. April Hannover Messe 2010: CoR-Lab presented together with CITEC "Interactive Intelligent Systems at Bielefeld University" at the international industry fair in Hanover. During the partner country Italy of this year not only the Light Weight Robot from KUKA Roboter was exhibited at the stand of Bielefeld University, but also an interactive exhibit on innovative drives was presented. The Instituto Italiano Di Technologia (IIT) in Genua develops it in the context of the cooperative EU-project AMARSi (Adaptive Modular Architectures for Rich Motor Skills). The stand was located at the common stand of the innovation network OWL in mechanical engineering (OWL Maschinenbau e. V.) at Hall 16, Stand A04.
The Mayor of Bielefeld Mr. Pit Clausen (on the right in this picture) and the Minister for Economics Affairs and Energy of the State of North-Rhine-Westphalia Mrs. Christa Thoben visited our stand and inquired about the advances in that high techology field.
CoR-Lab at "Forum Maschinenbau 2009"
4. - 6. November 2009 CoR-Lab will be at the action area of the innovation network OWL in mechanical engineering in Hall 23.1 at the Forum Maschinenbau (FMB) in Bad Salzuflen.
On the opening day at FMB there will be the first SME Automation and Robotics Congress with the closing discussion at 5:30 p.m. about challenges, solutions and trends including Prof. Dr. Jochen J. Steil (Managing Director CoR-Lab).
