https://orcid.org/0000-0003-0770-8717

Gordon Cheng has made pioneering contributions in Humanoid Robotics, Neuroengineering, Artificial Intelligence for the past 20 years. Since 2010, Gordon Cheng has been holding the Chair for Cognitive Systems, which he also founded. The Chair for Cognitive Systems is part of the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering at Technical University of Munich (TUM), Munich/Germany.

Gordon Cheng is also the Head of the CoC for Neuro-Engineering - Center of Competence Neuro-Engineering in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering. Since 2016, he has been the Program Director of the Elite Master of Science program in Neuroengineering (MSNE) of the Elite Network of Bavaria, a unique study program in Germany.

Formerly, he was the Head of the Department of Humanoid Robotics and Computational Neuroscience, ATR Computational Neuroscience Laboratories, Kyoto, Japan. He was the Group Leader for the JST International Cooperative Research Project (ICORP), Computational Brain. He has also been designated as a Project Leader/Research Expert for National Institute of Information and Communications Technology (NICT) of Japan. He is involved in a large number of major European Union Projects (e.g. RoboCub, Factory-in-a-Day, CONTEST-ITN, RoboCom-Flagship).

Gordon Cheng is the co-inventor of approximately 20 patents and author of approximately 300 technical publications, proceedings, editorials and book chapters. In 2014, he published the book "Humanoid Robotics and Neuroscience: Science, Engineering and Society". This interdisciplinarity has also been acknowledge by the IEEE, when being named IEEE Fellow in 2017 for his “contributions in humanoid robotic systems and neurorobotics”.

His research interests include: NeuroRobotics, Humanoid Robotics, Imitation Learning, Cognitive Systems, NeuroEngineering

2001               PhD in Systems Engineering, The Australian National University, Australia.

1991-1993      Master of Computer Science, University of Wollongong, Australia.                            

Blazing a trail: Technology & Science Delieverd, 2020.

The artificial skin that allows robots to feel, CNN, 11/28/2019

Was Roboter beim Abwaschen lernen können, Elektronikpraxis, 01/25/2019

2014   TUM Heinz Maier-Leibnitz Medal “in honour of his outstanding and internationally respected academic achievements at the interface between robotics and neuroscience”.

2014   William Mong Distinguished Award

2007   IEEE Gennai Medal

• Invited Talk, Global Forum on AI for Humanity, Paris, France, October 2019.
• Invited Talk, International Symposium on Machine Intelligence for Future Society 2019, Tokyo, Japan, September 2019.
• Invited Talk, Hamlyn Symposium for Medical Robotics, London, UK, June 2019.
• Keynote, SKOLKOVO Robotics, Robotics &AI, Moskow, Russia, April 2019.
• Keynote, SelPhyS, Workshop on applying self-awareness in the design of embedded and cyber-physical systems, Munich, Germany, April 2019.
• Invited talk, Liesel Beckmann Symposium 2018: Technology, Cognition and Dementia, Munich, Germany, December 2018.
• Invited Talk SFB 870 Winter Retreat 2018, Kloster Seeon, Germany, December 2018.
• Invited Talk VDE Tech Summit, Berlin, Germany, November 2018.
• Invited Talk First International Workshop on Smart Skins, Munich, Germany, November 2018.
• Invited talk 17. Europäischer Gesundheitskongress Munich, Germany, October 2018.
• Invited Talk IROS Conference Workshop on "1st Workshop on Proximity Perception in Robotics", Madrid, Spain, October 2018.
• Keynote Beijing Institute of Technology, Beijing, China, September 2018.
• Keynote Waseda University, Waseda, Japan, September 2018.
• Keynote National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology (AIST), Tsukuba, Japan, September 2018
• Keynote 27th IEEE International Conference on Robot and Human Interactive Communication, RO-MAN 2018, Nanjing/ China, August 2018
• Keynote International i.s.h.med live 2018, Barcelona, Spain, June 2018
• Keynote William Mong Distinguished Lectures in Engineering, The University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong/China June 2018
• Invited talk Neuroplasticity of Sensory Systems, Gordon Research Conference, Hong Kong, China, June 2018
• Invited talk 2018 GlobalTech Robotics Workshop, Sydney, Australia, May 2018
• Invited talk Workshop on 'Robotics and New Digital Skills: European and Australasian Dialogues',  Munich/Germany, May 2018
• Invited talk DIGITAL CONVENTION 2018, Berlin, Germany, April 2018
• Keynote speaker, Sky Sport Summit, Munich, Germany, March 2018
• Keynote speaker, ETIM 2018 Artificial intelligence and robotics, Essen, Germany, February 2018
• Keynote speaker, 3rd Movement Science Conference, Université de Versailles Saint-Quentin-en-Yvelines, Vélizy-Villacoublay, France, November 2017
• Keynote speaker, 2. SRH Zukunftskongress, Berlin, Germany, October 2017
• Keynote speaker, 23. Sportwissenschaftlichen Hochschultag der Deutschen Vereinigung für Sportwissenschaft (dvs), Munich/Germany, September 2017
• Invited Speaker, 14. Fachschaftstreffen Naturwissenschaften - Konrad Adenauer-Stiftung Bonn, Königswinter, Germany, July 2017
• Invited Speaker, HauptstadtKongress Gesundheit und Medizin, Berlin, Germany, June 2017
• Invited Speaker, Tech Trends Symposium - The new Era of Robotics Disruption, Hong Kong, Hong Kong, April 2017
• Invited Speaker, Workshop Body Image in Robots and in Humans, Paris, France, December 2016
• Invited Speaker, German - French Winter School Humanoid and Legged Robots, Toulouse, France, December 2016
• Invited talk, Bremer Universitäts-Gespräche 2016 symposium: Cognition-enabled Robotics: Democratising a Disruptive Technology, Bremen, Germany, November 2016
• Invited talk, Workshop Robotics in the 21st Century: Challenges and Promises, Göttingen, Germany, October 2016
• Invited talk, Séminaire sur l'Intelligence Artificielle et les Véhicules à Conduite Déléguée, Versailles, France, September 2016
• Keynote speaker, Keio University Top Global University Project “TGU Symposium on Smart Connected Cities, Yokohama, Japan, July 2016
• Invited talk, Workshop "Robots in Human Environments, Laboratoire d’Informatique de Grenoble, Grenoble, France, May 2016
• Invited talk, DHL Robotics day DHL Innovation Center Troisdorf, Bonn, Germany, April 2016
• Invited talk, DGKN Congress - Wieder laufen lernen, Düsseldorf, Germany, March 2016
• Keynote speaker, Forum be flexible Fraunhofer EMFT, Munich, Germany, November 2015   
• Invited Talk, Robotics Conference Wuxi High Tech manufacturing Association, Wuxi, China, November 2015
• Keynote speaker, 7th International Conference on Social Robotics (ICSR), Paris, France, October 2015
• Keynote speaker, 8th International Workshop on Human-Friendly Robotics (HFR 2015), Munich, Germany, October 2015       
• Invited Talk, Robotics Forum Asia Manufacturing Association, Guangzhou, China, September 2015
• Invited Talk, Siemens Sommergespräch, Munich, Germany, July 2015
• Keynote speaker, APAC Innovation Summit Series 2015 - Robotics, Hong Kong, Hong Kong, June 2015
• Invited Talk, 2nd World Robotics and Intelligent Equipment Industry Conference, Foshan New City, China, June 2015             
• Keynote speaker, 8. SCHUNK Expert Days on Service Robotics, Lauffen, Germany, February 2015
• Distinguished Lecture in Robotics, Systems and Control, Zurich, Switzerland, December 2014
• Invited Talk, NAIST Workshop, Nara, Japan, November 2014
• Invited Talk, German-Korean KAIST Symposium, Seoul, Korea, September 2014
• Invited Talk, University of Sidney, Australia, August 2014
• Invited Talk, University of Hong Kong, August 2014
• Invited Talk, Launch of "Technologist" in Copenhagen, Denmark, June 2014
• Invited Talk, GSN Retreat Spitzingsee, Germany, April 2014
• Invited Talk, University of Tokyo, Japan, March 2014
• William Mong Distinguished Lecture, Hong Kong, March 2014 
• Invited Talk, Xperience Project Summer School, Mallorca, Spain, October 2013
• Keynote speaker, European Students Conference, Berlin, Germany, September 2013
• Invited Talk, Robots on Tour, Zurich, Switzerland, March 2013
• Invited Talk, Duke Center of Neuro-Engineering, USA, November 2012
• Keynote speaker, Alpbach Technology Forum, Austria, August 2012
• Panel speaker at ZiF workshop on “Alignment in Communication”, Bielefeld, German, July 2012      
• Keynote speaker, Symposium on Robotic Skill Learning and Cognition, Lund, Sweden, April 2012
• William Mong Distinguished Lecture, Hong Kong, March 2012
• Keynote speaker, DRG Tage, Karlsruhe/Germany, October 2011
• Keynote speaker, Workshop “Philosophy Meets Robotics”, Munich, Germany, September 2011
• Keynote speaker, 8th Conference on Computing and Philosophy (ecap10) Munich, Germany, October 2010.
• Keynote speaker, Frontiers in Neuromorphic Computation, Paris, France, June 2010.
• Keynote speaker, 32nd Annual Conference on Artificial Intelligence (KI2009), Paderborn, Germany. September 2009;
• Keynote speaker, European Network for the Advancement of Artificial Cognitive Systems meeting, Venice, Italy. November 2008.
• Keynote speaker, Colloquium on “Cognitive Information Processing”, Munich, Germany. May 2008.
• Keynote speaker, JNRH 2008, Paris, France. May 2008.
• Invited lecturer, ESF-JSPS Frontier Science Conference on Robotics, Shonan International Village, Tokyo. March 2008. Keynote speaker, Robotics for Society, February 2007, Vancouver, Canada.
• Keynote speaker, NATAL Neuroscience, February 2007, Natal, Brazil.
• Keynote speaker, 2005 IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation, Barcelona, Spain, June 2005

1. Robot apparatus and method of controlling the same, US Patent Publication Number US20070220637 (A1).

2. Robot and attitude control method of robot:  Europe Patent Publication Number EP1510446 (A2); US Patent Publication Number US2005113973 (A1); Korea Patent Publication Number KR20050021288 (A); China Patent Publication Number CN1590039 (A).

3. Robot and attitude control method of robot: Europe Patent EP 1510446 (B1); US Patent US7657345 (B2); China Patent CN100346941 (C); Korea Patent Publication Number KR20050021288 (A).

4. Robot Device and Its Control Method, Japan Patent JP4587699 (B2).

5. Robot Device and Attitude Control Method for Robot, Japan Patent 4587738 (B2).

6. Robot Device and Its Control Method, Japan Patent Publication Number JP2006289602 (A).

7. Method and Device for Learning Phase Reaction Curve, Method and Device for Controlling Cyclic   Movement, and Walking Movement Controller, Japan Patent Publication Number JP2007175860 (A).

8. Robot Device and Its Control Method, Japan Patent Publication Number JP2007210071 (A).

9. Robot apparatus and method of controlling the same, US Patent US7949428 (B2).

10. Driving Method, Driving Control Device and Robot 2007-296618 Japan Patent Publication Number JP2007296618 (A).

11. Driving method, drive control apparatus, and robot, US Patent US7908032 (B2).

• Prof. Dr. Barbara Kühnlenz (former ICS-PostDoc) since 2019 Professor at Hochschule Coburg for Business Psychology, Germany.

• Prof Dr. Pablo Lanillos (former ICS-PostDoc) since 2019 Assistant Professor at Donders Institute for Brain, Cognition and Behaviour, Netherlands.

• Prof. Dr. Karinne Ramirez-Amaro  (former ICS-PostDoc) since 2019 Assistant Professor at Chalmers University of Technology, Sweden.

• Prof. Dr. Agnieszka Wykowska (former ICS-PostDoc) since 2016 PI Social Cognition in Human-Robot Interaction, Italian Institute of Technology, Genova/Italy & affiliated with Luleå University of Technology/Sweden as adjunct professor in Engineering Psychology.

• Prof. Jun Nakanishi (former ICS-PostDoc) since 2018 Associate Professor at Dept. of Mechanical Engineering, Faculty of Science and Technology Meijo University, Nagoya University/Japan.

• Dr. John Nassour (former ICS-PhD/PostDoc) until 2020  Lecturer and Researcher in Neurorobotics at Artificial Intelligence Professorship at Technical University of Chemnitz/Germany.

• Prof. Samer Alfayad (former ICS-PostDoc) since 2013 Associate Professor at Versailles ST-Quentin En-Yvelines University/France.

• Prof. Gen Endo, Associate Professor at Tokyo Institute of Technology/Japan.

• Dr. Jun Morimoto (former PostDoc), Head of Department of Brain Robot Interface (BRI), ATR Computational Neuroscience Labs/Japan.

H-index: 43 (06/2020, Google Scholar)

Upcoming book:

Ravinder Dahiya, Oliver Ozioko, and Gordon Cheng: Sensory Systems for Robotic Applications (The Institution of Engineering and Technology (IET)), forthcoming, 2020/2021.

Sensory systems comprising of various sensing modalities are fundamental to robotics – they provide information about the state of the environment and of the robotic system, which forms the basis for control, decision-making, and interaction. This book will cover robotic sensory hardware, related electronics, and system issues. Topics to be covered include various type of sensors used in robotics (tactile, vision, audio, accelerometers, gyros, force, torque, proximity, lasers, RFID, chemical, temperature, etc.), various sensing schemes (e-skin, tactile skin, e-nose, electronic/bionic eye, textiles, omnidirectional cameras, neuromorphic vision, and touch, etc.), various sensing technologies (solid-state sensors, miniaturized sensors, soft sensors, sensors with local computation, etc.), and system issues (wiring complexity, conformal electronics, power consumption, etc.).

Selected publications:

[1]  Z. Tayeb, R. Bose, A. Dragomir, L. E. Osborn, N. V. Thakor and G. Cheng: Decoding of Pain Perception using EEG Signals for a Real-Time Reflex System in Prostheses: A Case Study. Nature Scientific Reports 10, No1, 2020, 5606., (2020). (IF=3.998)

[2] G. Cheng, E. Dean-Leon, F. Bergner, J. R. G. Olvera, Q. Leboutet, and P. Mittendorfer: A Comprehensive Realization of Robot Skin: Sensors, Sensing, Control, and Applications, Proceedings of the IEEE, vol. 107, no. 10, pp. 2034-2051, 2019, doi: 10.1109/JPROC.2019.2933348. (IF=10.252)

[3] G. Cheng, K. Ramirez-Amaro, M. Beetz, and Y. Kuniyoshi, “Purposive learning: Robot reasoning about the meanings of human activities”. Science Robotics 4 (26), (2019). (IF=19.4)

[4] Dean, K. Ramirez-Amaro, F. Bergner, I. Dianov, G. Cheng: Integration of Advanced Robotic Technologies for Rapidly Deployable Industrial Robots. IEEE Transactions on Industrial Informatics (4) (2018). (IF=7.377)

[5]  K. Ramirez-Amaro, M. Beetz, G. Cheng: Transferring Skills to Humanoid Robots by Extracting Semantic Representations from Observations of Human Activities. Artificial Intelligence 247, 95-118 (2017). (IF=6.628)

[6] A. Wykowska, T. Chaminade, G. Cheng: Embodied artificial agents for understanding human social cognition. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London. B 371: 20150375 (2016). (IF=6.139)

[7] R. C. Donati, S. Shokur, E. Morya, D. S. F. Campos, R. C. Moioli, C. M. Gitti, P. B. Augusto, S. Tripodi, C. G. Pires, G. A. Pereira, F. L. Brasil, S. Gallo, A. A. Lin, A. K. Takigami, M. A. Aratanha, S. Joshi, H. Bleuler, G. Cheng, A. Rudolph, M. A. L. Nicolelis: Long-Term Training with a Brain-Machine Interface-Based Gait Protocol Induces Partial Neurological Recovery in Paraplegic Patients, Nature Scientific Reports, August 11 (2016). (IF=3.998)

[8] G. Cheng: Humanoid Robotics and Neuroscience: Science, Engineering and Society, Frontiers in Neuroengineering, CRC Pr Inc (Ed.), (2014). ISBN-10: 1420093665; ISBN-13: 978-1420093667.

[9]  J. Nassour, V. Hugel, F. B. Ouezdou, G. Cheng: Qualitative adaptive reward learning with success failure maps: applied to humanoid robot walking. IEEE Transactions on Neural Networks and Learning Systems, 24(1), 81-93 (2013). (IF=11.683)

[10] P. Mittendorfer and G. Cheng: Humanoid Multimodal Tactile-Sensing Modules. IEEE Transactions on Robotics, 27(2):401–410 (2011). (IF=6.483)