Robot Talk

Claire chatted to Kushant Patel from Brookhaven National Laboratory about robots that work in scientific facilities, such as particle accelerators.

Kushant Patel builds software that helps robots and instruments perceive, map, and move through the physical world. After completing a Master's in Mechatronics Engineering at the University of Waterloo, he spent two years at the University of California, Berkeley teaching quadruped robots to map and inspect nuclear material, and a year at the University of California, Davis building closed-loop brain-computer interfaces. At Brookhaven National Laboratory, he is developing control systems for advanced synchrotron beamlines.

This episode is powered by the Advanced Research + Invention Agency's Robot Dexterity programme, which aims to transform robotic capabilities and unlock a step-change in human productivity.

Support Robot Talk on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/ClaireAsher

Find out more about ARIA: https://aria.org.uk/

Last month, Claire hosted a panel discussion at AUV 2026 exploring how progress in marine autonomy resonates with different audiences, from engineers who are developing the technology, to the end users in science, industry and defence, and the young people who will become the next generation of engineers. She was joined by five panellists: Gwyn Griffiths, Daniel Hook, Emma Curtis, Sara Aldhaheri, and Edith-Clare Hall.

This bonus episode is brought to you by the IEEE Oceanic Engineering Society and the AUV Southampton organising committee, in partnership with Cellula Robotics and Sonardyne International.

Get access to the full catalogue of bonus episodes by becoming a supporter on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/ClaireAsher

During my recent visit to The National Robotarium in Edinburgh, I was lucky enough to get the chance to speak to some of the Robotarium's resident companies.

In this interview, I talked to Niall McGrath, CEO of Robocean, a company building and deploying robots to restore seagrass meadows – one of the most important marine ecosystems on Earth.

This episode was made possible by UK RAS STEPS, a programme supporting Research Technical Professionals in robotics and autonomous systems in the UK.

Claire chatted to Michelle Lu from Vsim Technology about using simulation and artificial intelligence to teach robots new skills.

Michelle Lu is co-founder and CEO of Vsim Technology. She was previously a Director of Simulation Technology at NVIDIA, where she and her co-founder created the world's first end-to-end GPU-accelerated reinforcement learning (RL) framework, Isaac Gym, which set the template for how modern GPU-accelerated simulation-based RL is performed in robotics. In 2022, Michelle and her co-founder left NVIDIA to create Vsim, driven to solve the limitations that plague simulation-based robotics AI: efficiency, scalability and the sim-to-real gap.

This episode is powered by the Advanced Research + Invention Agency's Robot Dexterity programme, which aims to transform robotic capabilities and unlock a step-change in human productivity.

Join the Robot Talk community on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/ClaireAsher

Find out more about ARIA: https://aria.org.uk/

Claire chatted to Aaron Edsinger from Hello Robot about their Stretch robots that can help people with mobility issues live more independently.

Aaron Edsinger is CEO and Co-Founder of Hello Robot, a robotics company dedicated to developing practical, safe, and accessible robots for people. With a passion for building robots and robot companies, Aaron has founded four companies focused on bringing human collaborative robots to the consumer, manufacturing, healthcare and research markets. As Robotics Director at Google, he led the business, product and technical development of two of Google's central investments in robotics, and helped to define the overall robotics strategy.

This episode is powered by the Advanced Research + Invention Agency's Robot Dexterity programme, which aims to transform robotic capabilities and unlock a step-change in human productivity.

Join the Robot Talk community on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/ClaireAsher

Find out more about ARIA: https://aria.org.uk/

During my recent visit to The National Robotarium in Edinburgh, I was lucky enough to get the chance to speak to some of the Robotarium's resident companies.

In this interview, I spoke to Lorenzo Conti, Founder and CEO of Crover, a company developing robots for autonomous grain storage management.

This episode was made possible by UK RAS STEPS, a programme supporting Research Technical Professionals in robotics and autonomous systems in the UK.

During my recent visit to The National Robotarium in Edinburgh, I was lucky enough to get the chance to speak to some of the Robotarium's resident companies.

In this interview, I chatted to Vladimir Ivan, Vice President of Robotics at Touchlab, a company developing e-skins to give robots the power of human touch.

This episode was made possible by UK RAS STEPS, a programme supporting Research Technical Professionals in robotics and autonomous systems in the UK.

Earlier this year, I was lucky enough to get a behind the scenes tour of The National Robotarium, a global robotics research institute based at Heriot-Watt University in Edinburgh.

Thomas McGravie, Senior Technician at the National Robotarium, showed me around their ground-breaking facilities. I also spoke to Steve Maclaren, Chief Operating Officer at The National Robotarium about the centre's history, goals and successes so far, and I had a brief chat with a humanoid robot called Ameca.

During my visit, I also had the opportunity to interview three of the Robotarium's resident companies: Touchlab, Robocean and Crover. Watch this space for those interviews publishing soon!

This episode was made possible by UK RAS STEPS, a programme supporting Research Technical Professionals in robotics and autonomous systems in the UK.

Find out more about The National Robotarium and their upcoming events: https://thenationalrobotarium.com/

This bonus episode features interviews from academic and industry experts at this year's European Robotics Forum in Stavanger, Norway.

During the conference, there were several workshops on sustainability, conservation, and environmental issues and I spoke to some of the presenters and attendees to find out about their reflections on the workshops.

This bonus episode was produced in collaboration with euRobotics — an international non-profit association that aims to boost European robotics research, development, and innovation.

This bonus episode features interviews from academic and industry experts at this year's European Robotics Forum in Stavanger, Norway.

During the conference, I attended a workshop on 'Drones for Difficult and Challenging Applications', which focussed on recent successes and outstanding challenges for aerial robots in a range of fields including healthcare, inspection, and maintenance.

This bonus episode was produced in collaboration with euRobotics — an international non-profit association that aims to boost European robotics research, development, and innovation.