General research interest: Cognitive and developmental robotics, predictive robotic manipulation, learning from demonstration, affordance learnings, symbol formation and rule learning from continuous robotic interaction.

Related research interest: Symbol formation and rule learning from continuous robotic interaction. We believe that through abstracting the continuous sensorimotor experience and acquired prediction capability of the robot in symbols and rules, we can obtain high-level reasoning, planning and communication capabilities. The symbols and rules can be exploited for better explaining and communication knowledge acquired by the robot through machine learning techniques. For this, we currently investigate the suitable ML and AI techniques (particular deep learning architectures, logical inference tools and symbolic planners) that can generate grounded abstract symbols and rules.

Brief description of institution: Bogazici University is a top ranking public university that was founded in 1863. It has been ranked 186th among the Best Global Universities Ranking 2020 by US News & World Report, which places Bogazici University as “The Best Global University” in Turkey. Computer Engineering department is ranked in 200-250 range in Computer Science globally by Times Higher Education. It currently admits students from top 450 among 1.5M students through a national university exam.

Brief description of Cognition, Learning and Robotics (CoLoRs) Lab: CoLoRs lab, led by Dr. Emre Ugur is composed of 3 PhD, 5 Msc and 2 Bsc students. We are involved in H2020 IMAGINE project (www.imagine2020.eu/) and also run joint projects with Tokyo and Osaka Universities.

http://colors.cmpe.boun.edu.tr/
https://www.cmpe.boun.edu.tr/~emre/