Living Machines Satellite 2020 Workshop is a virtual workshop entitled "Growing structures: bioinspired innovation insights for architecture and robotics". This event, co-organised by Dr. Mirko Kovac (ICL),  is to be held on 28 July 2020 . Dr. Kovac is also going to give a talk on "Tensile web construction and perching with aerial vehicles". Full program is available here .

International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA) 2020 is the largest robotics conference of its’ kind. A  virtual workshop entitled "Self-Assembling and Reconfigurable Systems" is to be held on Tuesday, 30 June 2020 . The event is co-organised by Dr. Mirko Kovac (ICL), who is also going to give an invited talk.  Full program is available here: https://www.selfassemblingsystems.org/program To view the full line-up of speakers, please check: https://www.selfassemblingsystems.org/invited-speakers

LARICS team was busy before the pandemic shut everything down for a few months.  Following his talk at E-Conference  Better Future of Healthy Ageing 2020 (BFHA 2020) , Professor Kovacic gave an  interview for ZIMO portal  on the preliminary work with Pepper robots being demonstrators of rehabilitation exercises and plans for the future of humanoid robots in healthcare. Full article (in Croatian) is available  here .

In celebration of the World Bee Day (May 20), Prof. Stjepan Bogdan held an invited talk “Swarm Intelligence in Animal-Robot Interaction” at the Technical Museum Nikola Tesla  in Zagreb. Prof. Bogdan presented very interesting results of research done on bee communication channels and social behaviour of bees. The talk was a part of a special programme the Museum had prepared to raise awareness of the importance of pollinators, the threats they face and their contribution to sustainable development.

On 12 March 2020 , the  review meeting of the first 15 months of the project implementation period (01/09/2018 - 30/11/2019) of project AeRoTwin was held online via WebEx due to special circumstances (COVID-19). The purpose of the meeting was to familiarize the project officer and the EC reviewer with the project activities and achievements accomplished in the relevant period. Along with the project officer Antonio Scarafino and the EC reviewer, the review meeting was attended by AeRoTwin coordinators Stjepan Bogdan and Ivana Mikolić , as well as the leaders of work packages (WPs) and project team members Silvia de los Santos (CTA) , José Ramiro Martinez de Dios (USE) , and Ashutosh Choubey (ICL) . During the meeting, project partners had the opportunity to present their respective WPs and discuss relevant issues as well as the plan for the upcoming period.

Prof. Zdenko Kovacic attended European Robotics Forum (ERF) that was held 3-5 March 2020 in Malaga, Spain . Prof. Kovačić joined AeRoTwin project partners from the University of Seville , José Ramiro Martinéz de Dios, and Silvia de los Santos from Technological Corporation of Andalusia in promoting AeRoTwin project, attending lectures and workshops, and networking. This was the 11th Annual European Robotics Forum ‘Future Robotics: Unlocking Human Potential’ hosted by Trade Fair and Congress Centre of Malaga (FYCMA). This iconic event put Spain at the heart of Europe’s most influential forum for robotics and artificial intelligence (AI). More about ERF 2020 at https://www.eu-robotics.net/robotics_forum/press/malaga-inspires-erf202.html

In line with recommendation given by National Civil Protection Headquarters and Croatian Institute of Public Health, and in order to mitigate the spread of coronavirus disease,  DroneDays 2020 is postoned  until further notice. New dates have yet to be determined.

LARICS team participated in the international robotics competition MBZIRC held from 23 to 27 February 2020. The Mohamed Bin Zayed International Robotics Challenge ( MBZIRC ) is a biennial international robotics competition, organized by  Khalifa University . The competition is held in Abu Dhabi, UAE, and is intended to be an ambitious and challenging set of tasks that aims to inspire innovative robotics solutions and technical excellence. LARICS team for the MBZIRC2020 was led by Frano Petric with supervision of professors Stjepan Bogdan and Matko Orsag, and consists of LARICS’ PhD students: Barbara Arbanas, Marko Car, Antun Ivanovic, Marsela Polic, Ivan Hrabar, Ivo Vatavuk, Lovro Markovic, Ana Batinovic, Antonella Barisic, Robert Milijas and Marko Krizmancic. Being the robotics laboratory, LARICS decided to do the challenges autonomously. Read all about LARICS' participation at MBZIRC at  http://larics-mbzirc.fer.hr/index.php/mbzirc2020/