Sitemap
A list of all the posts and pages found on the site. For you robots out there, there is an XML version available for digesting as well.
Pages
About me
About me
Posts
Lessons Learned on Remote Teaching
Published:
Some lessons learned from TA-ing the remote class Dynamics and Control of Legged Locomotion with prof. David Remy, Uni Stuttgart in the spring semester of 2020.
LaTeXiT and ghostscript 9.27
Published:
update As of ghostscript version 9.50 (possibly earlier), this is no longer issue, so you can unpin and brew upgrade to your heart’s content.
JSPS fellowship, final interview
Published:
In a previous post I documented the paper application for the JSPS scholarship fellowship. A number of applicants are accepted outright after this step, however a number are required to give a final interview in the form of a 4-minute powerpoint presentation. I was in this second set, and here is my advice for this final part.
JSPS fellowship, paper application
Published:
I’m a grad student at this lab in Japan, and after many trials and tribulations I managed to get the JSPS DC 1 scholarship fellowship. This fellowship is rather competitive, and I felt that due to lack of English information as well as many cultural differences, the application is somewhat challenging and confusing for foreigners. This post is meant to give some suggestions and hopefully help other would-be applicants.
Getting a scholarship for grad studies in Japan
Published:
Yesterday, perfectly timed on Christmas day, I received an e-mail confirmation that I had received the JSPS DC1 scholarship fellowship (Note: I much later found out JSPS is a fellowship and not a scholarship! This means I pay taxes on it, and tuition isn’t automatically waived as it would be for the MEXT scholarship -__- and the miscommunications continue in the land of the rising sun) for pursuing my PhD in Japan, this lab. やった！ I had gone through a lengthy and painstaking application process, finishing the paper application last April, then going through a second ‘Interview’ screening, and finally 7 months later getting a confirmation that I wouldn’t need to worry about doing this again.
Finding a scholarship turned out to be very difficult, with information in English generally scarce and outdated, so after the frustrating ordeal of the paper application was over, I vowed that if I got it I would document the process, my opinions and suggestions, in the hope that it might help others who find themselves in a similar situation. This is that story.
publications
On designing an active tail for body-pitch control in legged robots via decoupling of control objectives
Published in In the proceedings of ASSISTIVE ROBOTICS: Proceedings of the 18th International Conference on CLAWAR 2015, 2015
Use Google Scholar for full citation
Recommended citation: Steve Heim, Mostafa Ajallooeian, Peter Eckert, Massimo Vespignani, Auke Ijspeert, "On designing an active tail for body-pitch control in legged robots via decoupling of control objectives." In the proceedings of ASSISTIVE ROBOTICS: Proceedings of the 18th International Conference on CLAWAR 2015, 2015.
On designing an active tail for legged robots: simplifying control via decoupling of control objectives
Published in Industrial Robot: An International Journal, 2016
Use Google Scholar for full citation
Recommended citation: Steve Heim, Mostafa Ajallooeian, Peter Eckert, Massimo Vespignani, Auke Ijspeert, "On designing an active tail for legged robots: simplifying control via decoupling of control objectives." Industrial Robot: An International Journal, 2016.
Learning from outside the viability kernel: Why we should build robots that can fall with grace
Published in In the proceedings of Conference on Simulation, Modeling, and Programming for Autonomous Robots (SIMPAR), 2018
Use Google Scholar for full citation
Recommended citation: S. {Heim}, A. {Spr\"{o}witz}, "Learning from outside the viability kernel: Why we should build robots that can fall with grace." In the proceedings of Conference on Simulation, Modeling, and Programming for Autonomous Robots (SIMPAR), 2018.
Shaping in Practice: Training Wheels to Learn Fast Hopping Directly in Hardware
Published in In the proceedings of International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA), 2018
Use Google Scholar for full citation
Recommended citation: S. {Heim}, F. {Ruppert}, A. {Sarvestani}, A. {Spr{\"o}witz}, "Shaping in Practice: Training Wheels to Learn Fast Hopping Directly in Hardware." In the proceedings of International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA), 2018.
Learning from outside the viability kernel: Why we should build robots that can fall with grace
Published in In the proceedings of International Conference on Simulation, Modeling, and Programming for Autonomous Robots (SIMPAR), 2018
Use Google Scholar for full citation
Recommended citation: S. {Heim}, A. {Spr\"{o}witz}, "Learning from outside the viability kernel: Why we should build robots that can fall with grace." In the proceedings of International Conference on Simulation, Modeling, and Programming for Autonomous Robots (SIMPAR), 2018.
A Learnable Safety Measure
Published in In the proceedings of Conference on Robot Learning (CoRL), 2019
Use Google Scholar for full citation
Recommended citation: Steve Heim, Alexander Rohr, Sebastian Trimpe, Alexander Badri-Spr{\"o}witz, "A Learnable Safety Measure." In the proceedings of Conference on Robot Learning (CoRL), 2019.
Beyond Basins of Attraction: Quantifying Robustness of Natural Dynamics
Published in IEEE Transactions on Robotics (TRO), 2019
Use Google Scholar for full citation
Recommended citation: S. {Heim}, A. {Spr\"{o}witz}, "Beyond Basins of Attraction: Quantifying Robustness of Natural Dynamics." IEEE Transactions on Robotics (TRO), 2019.
A little damping goes a long way: a simulation study of how damping influences task-level stability in running
Published in Biology letters, 2020
Use Google Scholar for full citation
Recommended citation: Steve Heim, Matthew Millard, Charlotte Le, Alexander Badri-Spr{\"o}witz, "A little damping goes a long way: a simulation study of how damping influences task-level stability in running." Biology letters, 2020.
An open torque-controlled modular robot architecture for legged locomotion research
Published in IEEE Robotics and Automation Letters (RAL), 2020
Use Google Scholar for full citation
Recommended citation: Felix Grimminger, Avadesh Meduri, Majid Khadiv, Julian Viereck, Manuel W{\"u}thrich, Maximilien Naveau, Vincent Berenz, Steve Heim, Felix Widmaier, Thomas Flayols, Jonathan Fiene, Alexander Badri-Spröwitz, Ludovic Righetti, "An open torque-controlled modular robot architecture for legged locomotion research." IEEE Robotics and Automation Letters (RAL), 2020.
On exploration requirements for learning safety constraints
Published in In the proceedings of Learning for Dynamics and Control (L4DC), 2021
Use Google Scholar for full citation
Recommended citation: Pierre-Fran{\c{c}}ois Massiani, Steve Heim, Sebastian Trimpe, "On exploration requirements for learning safety constraints." In the proceedings of Learning for Dynamics and Control (L4DC), 2021.
Safe Value Functions
Published in IEE Transactions on Automatic Control, 2021
Use Google Scholar for full citation
Recommended citation: Pierre-Fran{\c{c}}ois Massiani, Steve Heim, Friedrich Solowjow, Sebastian Trimpe, "Safe Value Functions." arXiv preprint arXiv:2105.12204, 2021.
Learning fast and precise pixel-to-torque control: A platform for reproducible research of learning on hardware
Published in IEEE Robotics & Automation Magazine (RAM), 2022
Use Google Scholar for full citation
Recommended citation: Steffen Bleher, Steve Heim, Sebastian Trimpe, "Learning fast and precise pixel-to-torque control: A platform for reproducible research of learning on hardware." IEEE Robotics & Automation Magazine (RAM), 2022.
Safe value functions
Published in IEEE Transactions on Automatic Control (TAC), 2022
Use Google Scholar for full citation
Recommended citation: Pierre-Fran{\c{c}}ois Massiani, Steve Heim, Friedrich Solowjow, Sebastian Trimpe, "Safe value functions." IEEE Transactions on Automatic Control (TAC), 2022.
Benchmarking potential based rewards for learning humanoid locomotion
Published in In the proceedings of IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA), 2023
Use Google Scholar for full citation
Recommended citation: Se Jeon, Steve Heim, Charles Khazoom, Sangbae Kim, "Benchmarking potential based rewards for learning humanoid locomotion." In the proceedings of IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA), 2023.
Optimal scheduling of models and horizons for model hierarchy predictive control
Published in In the proceedings of IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA), 2023
Use Google Scholar for full citation
Recommended citation: Charles Khazoom, Steve Heim, Daniel Gonzalez-Diaz, Sangbae Kim, "Optimal scheduling of models and horizons for model hierarchy predictive control." In the proceedings of IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA), 2023.
FLD: Fourier Latent Dynamics for Structured Motion Representation and Learning
Published in In the proceedings of International Conference on Learning Representations (ICLR), 2024
Recommended citation: Chenhao Li, Elijah Stanger-Jones, Steve Heim, Sangbae Kim, "FLD: Fourier Latent Dynamics for Structured Motion Representation and Learning." In the proceedings of International Conference on Learning Representations (ICLR), 2024.
Download Paper
Learning Emergent Gaits with Decentralized Phase Oscillators: on the role of Observations, Rewards, and Feedback
Published in In the proceedings of IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA), 2024
Use Google Scholar for full citation
Recommended citation: Jenny Zhang, Steve Heim, Se Jeon, Sangbae Kim, "Learning Emergent Gaits with Decentralized Phase Oscillators: on the role of Observations, Rewards, and Feedback." In the proceedings of IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA), 2024.