OpenTribot Revived 24.6.2014

The OpenTribot project has moved its software repository to GitHub, allowing anyone who wishes to construct their own soccer robot to get started on this open source system once again.

52. Jahrestagung DGfE im World Conference Center Bonn 15.5.2014

Auf der 52. Jahrestagung der Deutschen Gesellschaft für Epileptologie hatte das Machine Learning Lab die Gelegenheit, seine Arbeit in einer ganz besonderen Umgebung zu präsentieren. Im World Conference Center Bonn - dem ehmaligen Bundestagsgebäude - stellte Manuel Blum die aktuellen Ergebnisse des BrainLinks-BrainTools Projektes “Early Seizure Detection” einem medizinischen Fachpublikum vor.

Combining EEG and Reinforcement Learning for Robot Control 18.4.2013

As a demonstration of the idea behind the NeuroBots project we developed a prototype system to control an autonomous robotic arm's actions using an EEG device. The user merely selects an object, which the arm then grasps by itself using behaviours acquired through reinforcement learning. A video of the system is available in the media section.

BrainLinks-BrainTools Cluster of Excellence Launched 18.4.2013

Last week, the BrainLinks-BrainTools Cluster of Excellence here at the University of Freiburg was officially launched. It aims to push research on brain-machine interfaces for disease prevention and rehabilitation forward. The Machine Learning Lab will be participating in the context of three different project dealing with the development of intelligent prostheses, detection of epileptic seizures, and reinforcement learning in real neural networks. Our project listing has been updated with more detailed descriptions and links.

System Design Project Competition 11.2.2013

The annual final competition of the System Design Project will take place this Friday, February 15. First year students will compete with LEGO robots developed over the past semester to finish an unknown course as quickly as possible. This year, a livestream will be available as well, which you can watch here.

Software Releases and Updates 15.1.2013

We are happy to announce our brand new download section. Aside from the long-anticipated fundamental upgrade to the CLS² machine learning framework, several new open-source projects have been added: Tapir, a complementary modular object detection tool; libgp, a stand-alone Gaussian Process library; and motld, a C++ implementation of the TLD object detection algorithm with multi-object support. Find these projects in the Downloads section to the left.

Visual Deep Learning 9.8.2012

For the challenging pole balancing task we developed a system which uses raw visual input data to learn a control strategy. Using a neural network - a deep autoencoder - we were able to compress the relevant information in the camera images to a low dimensional feature space which was used as system states for reinforcement learning. (see Video)

Open Source RoboCup Mid-Size Robot 20.4.2012

We are proud to introduce the new Website for openTribot, our Open Source RoboCup Mid-Size Robotic Platform. The DFG Transfer Projects Goal was the creation of a robust, easy to use, performant Robot that can be used in RoboCup Mid-Size Soccer. Our Prototype Robots are complete and can be programmed with the ROS Robotic Operating System. Project Website

New EXIST-grant awarded to Group Member 7.11.2011

We congratulate Sascha and Patrick to their recently awarded “EXIST-Gründerstipendium”. This grant will allow them to work full-time on their idea of founding a new, highly-innovative games company here in Freiburg (see http://www.5dlab.com). Their next product will be a location-aware strategy-MMO.

A Neural Racing Car Driver 27.05.2011

Learning to drive a virtual racing car - this idea was realized in the bachelor thesis written by Thorsten Engesser. A neural network based driver learns to drive fast but save, controlling the car by steering, breaking and accelerating. The learning car is realized in the Torcs-framework, showing highly competitive driving behaviour, finally learned from the experience of success and failure (see video). Our data-efficient batch-RL scheme NFQ was used to realize the learning. More learning videos can be found in this list.

Reinforcement Learning in Computer Games 24.09.2010

Machine learning meets space shooter: This YouTube video shows the results of applying several reinforcement learning approaches for the game Star Ships, in the scope of the Star Ships Learning Framework. These results were obtained as part of the Bachelor thesis by Christian Lutz. More learning videos can be found in this list.

Robot Workshop for the “Schnupperstudium Informatik” 27.07.2010

In this robot Workshop the autonomous Festo Robot Platform Robotino is used to introduce female students to robot programming. These omnidirectional robots can sense the environment through different sensors and can fullfill tasks like collecting objects or follow a line autonomously.

Our soocer robot is 'Freiburger der Woche' 28.04.2010

Our new soccer robot for the Robocup MidSize league was elected 'Freiburger der Woche' by the weekly newspaper 'Stadtkurier'. The new robot, is developped together with our industrial partner Harting KgAa as an open source project, funded by the DFG. Press release can be found here. Read more about the project at the project page.

Brainstormers 2D win German Open 2010! 18.04.2010

With a 1:0 victory in overtime the Brainstormers 2D won the simulation league tournament at this years RoboCup German Open event. After dominating the whole tournament, the Brainstormers quickly took control of the final game as well, but needed several chances and the overtime to score the deciding goal against team Nemesis. Detailed results and videos from the games can be found here.

World premiere: Our soocer robot hired by foreign team 16.04.2010

Our new soccer robot for the Robocup MidSize league is a special one: it is designed to be able to integrate itself into foreign teams. In cooperation with our industrial partner, Harting KgAa, this robot is developped as an open source project, funded by the DFG. At German Open 2010, this robot plays for the first time as a hired member of the current world-champion team, RFC Stuttgart. Read more at the project page.

Robot programming workshop 23.10.2009

In the workshop with apprentices from our sponsor Harting, the participants successfully programmed a robot to collect tennis balls and return them to a predefined location.

Special Lecture: Robot Learning

Application for participation in the Special Lecture on Robot Learning is now open. More information on the application procedure can be found in the notes of the first meeting. Deadline: Monday, Nov 23rd.

Student Assistants wanted

We are currently looking for student assistants to support us in system administration and website content management as well as general research. In addition we are always looking for students who want to do their master's or diploma thesis in the area of machine learning. If you're interested, just drop by (1st floor, Building 079)

We moved to Freiburg 01.04.2009

Our research group has just settled in at its new location at the Albert-Ludwigs University Freiburg. We are presently in the process of creating this new website. Our former website is still online an can be visited by following this link.