Funded Research

2023

U.S. Army GVSC: Enhancing UGV Navigation with Adaptive Human Intervention, 2023-2024 

($138,000) PIs with Dawn Tilbury and Lionel Robert. Terms of agreement are: $100,000 per year renewable for up to 3 years. The objective of this proposal is to develop methods that can help semi-autonomous UGVs that are navigating uncertain and complex terrain effectively request and incorporate human input to arrive at their desired destination.

2022

($136,000) PIs with Dawn Tilbury and Lionel Robert. Terms of agreement are: $100,000 per year renewable for up to 3 years. The objective of this proposal is to develop methods for estimating and calibrating situational awareness in teams to improve human-robot teaming performance.

2021

Army Research Laboratory (ARL): Strengthening Teamwork for Robust Operations in Novel Groups (STRONG): Building Trust Across Dynamic, Heterogeneous Teams, 2021-2022

($100,000) Co-PI with: PI Dawn Tilbury.  The objective is to address the question: “How do we provide the capability for agents to understand and evolve symbiotically with humans?” In particular, we will consider the aspect of trust in a dynamic heterogeneous team.

($250,000 to 300,000) PIs with Dawn Tilbury and Lionel Robert. The objective of this proposal is to identify the information needed to support SA and trust repair to avoid failure in multi-agent human-automation teams. 

2020

($231,225) Co-PI with: PI Xi Jessie Yang, Dawn Tilbury, Feng Zhou and Lisa J. Molnar. The objective of this proposal is to develop a standard set of metrics for measuring takeover quality (and also, takeover performance).

AAA Foundation: Measuring and Predicting Drivers’ Takeover Readiness in Automated Driving, 2020-2021

($222,494) Co-PI with: PI Xi Jessie Yang, Dawn Tilbury, Feng Zhou and Lisa J. Molnar. The objective of this proposal is to develop computational models capable of predicting drivers’ takeover readiness by analyzing driver's physiological data and external traffic in real-time. 

2018

Toyota Research Institute (TRI): Examining the Impact of Implicit and Explicit AV Communications on Pedestrians’ Trust,  2018-2019 

($150,000) Co-PIs: Dawn Tilbury, Anuj K Pradhan and Xi Jessie Yang The objective of this proposal is to understand how implicit and explicit AV communications can facilitate pedestrian's trust in AVs.

MCity: Predicting Drivers’ Takeover Readiness and Designing Adaptive In-Vehicle Alert System,  2018-2019 

($300,000) Co-PI with: PI Xi Jessie Yang, Dawn Tilbury, Anuj K Pradhan and Feng Zhou. The objective of this proposal is to predict drivers’ takeover readiness and design an adaptive alert system. 

2017

ARC -TARDEC: Modeling Bi-directional Trust in Semi-Autonomy,  2017-2019

($300,000) Co-PI with Dawn Tilbury. Terms of agreement are: $100,000 per year renewable for up to 3 years. The objective of this proposal is to model mutual trust between the driver and autonomous vehicles in convoy operations.

MCity: Explanations and Expectations of AVs,  2017-2018

($300,000) PI with Co-PIs: Dawn Tilbury and Anuj K Pradhan. The objective of this proposal is to understand driver’s expectation of their autonomous vehicle and the explanation their autonomous vehicle should provide to address the concerns of the driver.

Toyota Research Institute (TRI): Control and Trust between Drivers and AVs,  2017

($100,000) PI with Co-PIs: Dawn Tilbury and Anuj K Pradhan. The objective of this proposal is to understand when a driver is likely to take control of an autonomous vehicle and when an autonomous vehicle should take control.