Christian Lenz, Max Schwarz, Andre Rochow, Bastian Pätzold, Raphael
Memmesheimer, Michael Schreiber, and Sven Behnke:
NimbRo wins ANA Avatar XPRIZE Immersive Telepresence Competition:
Human-Centric Evaluation and Lessons Learned
International Journal of Social Robotics (SORO), Springer, 17(3): 337-361, 2025.
Raphael Memmesheimer, Christian Lenz, Max Schwarz, Michael
Schreiber, and Sven Behnke:
Self-Centering 3-DOF Feet
Controller for Hands-Free Locomotion Control in Telepresence and
Virtual Reality
In Proceedings of IEEE Conference on Telepresence (Telepresence), Pasadena, CA, USA,
November 2024.
Max Schwarz, Christian Lenz, Raphael Memmesheimer, Bastian Pätzold,
Andre Rochow, Michael Schreiber, and Sven Behnke:
Robust Immersive Telepresence and Mobile Telemanipulation: NimbRo
wins ANA Avatar XPRIZE Finals
In Proceedings of IEEE-RAS 22nd International Conference on
Humanoid Robots (Humanoids), Austin, USA, December 2023.
Finalist for Best Oral Paper Award.
[Video]
Sven Behnke, Julie Adams, and David Locke:
The $10 Million ANA Avatar XPRIZE Competition Advanced Immersive
Telepresence Systems
Accepted for IEEE Robotics and Automation Magazine, to appear 2023.
[Extended version arXiv:2308.07878]
Max Schwarz, Christian Lenz, Raphael Memmesheimer, Bastian Pätzold,
Andre Rochow, Michael Schreiber, Sven Behnke:
Robust Immersive Telepresence and Mobile Telemanipulation: NimbRo
wins ANA Avatar XPRIZE Finals
Preprint arXiv:2303.03297, March 2023.
5.11.2022
Our team NimbRo won the ANA Avatar XPRIZE Finals.
In the Day 2 testing run, the Operator Judge solved through our Avatar
System all ten tasks of this competition in only 5:50 min. We received
also all five points for telepresence quality, resulting in a perfect
score of 15/15 points. The prize money is 5M US$.
[Press release]
[NimbRo_Avatar_Finals_Day_2_2022_11_05.mp4]
NimbRo is the robot competition team of the Autonomous Intelligent Systems lab of University of Bonn, Germany.
The lab is part of the
Computer Science Institute VI – Intelligent Systems and
Robotics, which is headed by
Prof. Dr. Sven Behnke.
4.11.2022
On the first day of the Finals Testing, we had the second to last
slot. The Operator Judge solved through our Avatar system all ten
tasks in 8:15 minutes.
We also received full scores from the Operator and Recipient Judges
for telepresence quality.
With a score of 15/15, our team NimbRo is leading. Tomorrow, the 12
best teams get a chance to improve their score.
[NimbRo_Avatar_Finals_Day_1_2022_11_04.mp4]
3.11.2022
Our Avatar system is operational in our Team Garage. We practice
operator training. In the evening, our Avatar was for the first time
tested in the arena of the ANA Avatar XPRIZE Finals. Despite WiFi
issues, the Operator Judge solved through our Avatar System all ten
tasks of this competition. This qualifies our team NimbRo for the
Finals Test tomorrow.
[NimbRo_Avatar_Finals_Qualification_2022_11_03_m.mp4]
2.11.2022
We assemble the Avatar robot and the Operator Station. Teams had a
first look at the arena. Our robot went to the photo shooting.
1.11.2022
Our team arrived at the
ANA Avatar XPRIZE Finals, which take place in Long Beach, CA, USA.
[NimbRo_Avatar_Semifinals_Run2.mp4]
21.10.2021
Our team NimbRo came in first in the ANA Avatar XPRIZE Semifinals. The
jury gave our test runs an almost perfect score of 99/100 points.
[Press release]
18.9.2021
The second and last testing day at the ANA Avatar Xprize Challenge
Semifinals also went very well. We may have received even more points
than yesterday.
[NimbRo_Avatar_Operator_Training.mp4]
17.9.2021
The first testing day went very well. The judges solved all tasks in
the three test scenarios. They were pleased with the immersion in the
remote scene as well as the presence of the remote operator and
consequently awarded our team an almost perfect score.
16.9.2021
We are participating in the ANA Avatar Xprize Challenge Semifinals in
Miami, Florida.
Our Avatar system arrived and is operational.
2.7.2021
We submitted our Semifinals Team Video to XPRIZE.
[NimbRo_Avatar_Semifinals_Team_Video.mp4]
5.4.2021
Our team NimbRo has been selected as
Semifinalist for the ANA AVATAR XPRIZE Challenge.
8.1.2020
Our team NimbRo is one of the
qualified teams selected to participate at the ANA AVATAR
XPRIZE Challenge.
29.9.2019
NimbRo registered for the
ANA AVATAR XPRIZE Challenge.
Max Schwarz, Christian Lenz, Raphael Memmesheimer, Bastian Pätzold,
Andre Rochow, Michael Schreiber, Sven Behnke:
Robust Immersive Telepresence and Mobile Telemanipulation: NimbRo
wins ANA Avatar XPRIZE Finals
Preprint arXiv:2303.03297, March 2023.
Christian Lenz and Sven Behnke:
Bimanual Telemanipulation with Force and Haptic Feedback trough an
Anthropomorphic Avatar System
Robotics and Autonomous Systems, 161(2):104338, Elsevier, March
2023.
Andre Rochow, Max Schwarz, Michael Schreiber, and Sven Behnke:
VR Facial Animation for Immersive Telepresence Avatars
In Proceedings of IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Intelligent
Robots and Systems (IROS), Kyoto, Japan, October 2022.
[Videos]
Max Schwarz, Christian Lenz, Andre Rochow, Michael Schreiber and Sven
Behnke:
NimbRo Avatar: Interactive Immersive Telepresence with
Force-Feedback Telemanipulation
Accepted for IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Intelligent Robots
and Systems (IROS), Prague, Czech Republic, September 2021.
[Video]
Christian Lenz and Sven Behnke:
Bimanual Telemanipulation with Force and Haptic Feedback and
Predictive Limit Avoidance
In Proceedings of 10th European Conference on Mobile Robots (ECMR),
Bonn, Germany, September 2021.
[Video]
Max Schwarz and Sven Behnke:
Low-Latency Immersive 6D Televisualization with Spherical
Rendering
In Proceedings of IEEE-RAS 20th International Conference on Humanoid
Robots (Humanoids), Munich, July 2021.
Finalist for Best Oral Paper Award
[Video]
NimbRo has extensive experience and outstanding success with robotics
competitions and challenges:
These successes are based on contributions to science that are reflected in a large number of publications. Main research areas are computer vision, mapping and localization, locomotion and manipulation planning, and deep learning.
NimbRo has developed intuitive robotic telepresence systems for domestic service, space exploration, and disaster response.
Tobias Klamt, Diego Rodriguez, Lorenzo Baccelliere, Xi Chen, Domenico
Chiaradia, Torben Cichon, Massimiliano Gabardi, Paolo Guria, Karl
Holmquist, Malgorzata Kamedula, Hakan Karaoguz, Navvab Kashiri, Arturo
Laurenzi, Christian Lenz, Daniele Leonardis, Enrico Mingo, Luca
Muratore, Dmytro Pavlichenko, Francesco Porcini, Zeyu Ren, Fabian
Schilling, Max Schwarz, Massimiliano Solazzi, Michael Felsberg,
Antonio Frisoli, Michael Gustmann, Patric Jensfelt, Klas Nordberg,
Juergen Rossmann, Uwe Suess, Nikos Tsagarakis, and Sven Behnke:
Flexible Disaster Response of Tomorrow - Final Presentation and
Evaluation of the CENTAURO System
IEEE Robotics and Automation Magazine, Special Issue on Humanoid Robot
Applications in Real World Scenarios, December 2019.
[Video]
Tobias Klamt, Max Schwarz, Christian Lenz, Lorenzo Baccelliere,
Domenico Buongiorno, Torben Cichon, Antonio DiGuardo, David Droeschel,
Massimiliano Gabardi, Malgorzata Kamedula, Navvab Kashiri, Arturo
Laurenzi, Daniele Leonardis, Luca Muratore, Dmytro Pavlichenko, Arul
S. Periyasamy, Diego Rodriguez, Massimiliano Solazzi, Antonio Frisoli,
Michael Gustmann, Jürgen Roßmann, Uwe Süss, Nikos G. Tsagarakis, and
Sven Behnke:
Remote mobile manipulation with the Centauro robot:
Full‐body telepresence and autonomous operator
assistance
Journal of Field Robotics (JFR), Wiley, 2019.
[Video]
Max Schwarz, Tobias Rodehutskors, David Droeschel, Marius Beul,
Michael Schreiber, Nikita Araslanov, Ivan Ivanov, Christian Lenz, Jan
Razlaw, Sebastian Schüller, David Schwarz, Angeliki
Topalidou-Kyniazopoulou, and Sven Behnke:
NimbRo Rescue: Solving Disaster-Response Tasks through Mobile
Manipulation Robot Momaro
Journal of Field Robotics (JFR) 34(2):400–425, 2017.
Max Schwarz, Marius Beul, David Droeschel, Sebastian Schüller, Arul
Selvam Periyasamy, Christian Lenz, Michael Schreiber, and Sven
Behnke:
Supervised Autonomy for Exploration and Mobile Manipulation in
Rough Terrain with a Centaur-like Robot
Frontiers in Robotics and AI, section Humanoid Robotics, vol. 3,
article 57, October 2016.
Jörg Stückler, Max Schwarz, and Sven Behnke:
Mobile Manipulation, Tool Use, and Intuitive Interaction for
Cognitive Service Robot Cosero
Frontiers in Robotics and AI, section Humanoid Robotics, vol. 3,
November 2016.
Tobias Rodehutskors, Max Schwarz, and Sven Behnke:
Intuitive Bimanual Telemanipulation under Communication
Restrictions by Immersive 3D Visualization and Motion
Tracking
In Proceedings of IEEE-RAS International Conference on Humanoid Robots
(Humanoids), Seoul, Korea, November 2015.
Max Schwarz, Jörg Stückler, and Sven Behnke:
Mobile Teleoperation Interfaces with Adjustable Autonomy for
Personal Service Robots
In Proceedings of the 9th ACM/IEEE International Conference on
Human-Robot Interaction (HRI), pp. 288-289, Bielefeld, Germany, 2014.
Sebastian Muszynski, Jörg Stückler, and Sven Behnke:
Adjustable Autonomy for Mobile Teleoperation of Personal Service
Robots
In Proceedings of IEEE International Symposium on Robot and Human
Interactive Communication (RO-MAN), Paris, France, September 2012.
