This proposal will support U.S. Ph.D. students working in robotics the opportunity to share their knowledge and interact with each other and more senior researchers, to learn about different sub-fields within robotics, to meet potential employers, and to become apprised of new technology that will be demonstrated by vendors. This goal will be accomplished by partially supporting the travel costs for U.S. Ph.D. students to attend the International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS), which is one of two major international robotics conferences co-sponsored by the IEEE Robotics and Automation Society. The conference, which in 2016 will be held in Daejeon DCC, South Korea, attracts an international crowd that includes academics, industry workers, entrepreneurs, and funding agency leaders.
