purplecat

A group of people in overalls holding hard hats, squinting into the sun. Most of the overalls are bright orange. I am at the front. We are standing in front of a building signed Jacobs 210 C Technology and Innovation Centre.

There is a genre of research project photos that could be categorised as "PDRAs in Hard Hats". There is, in fact, only one PDRA in the above image and none of us are actually wearing our hard hats, but still. This was in aid of a new "Prosperity Partnership" project, Centre for Robotic Autonomy in Demanding and Long-lasting Environments (CRADLE) with a company called Jacobs. It will pay for a bunch of PhD students and a smattering of PDRAs looking at deployment of autonomous robotics. I'm leading the work package on Assurance.

This is us visiting Jacobs where the engineers were very excited by all their test environments. It was pretty cool but, sadly, I don't think I will have much to do with setting robots loose in them.

And a bonus Blade/Lester icon. Blade is an original character in the Primeval fandom (which has a lot of those for Reasons). I think I made this in response to

fredbassett's secret Santa story in which Blade is acting as bodyguard to Lester, but I could be wrong. Anyway, since I don't suppose there is much general call for Blade/Lester icons, I only made one.

Lester from Primeval plus the OC Blade.

Snagging is free. Credit is appreciated. Comments are loved.

Texture in the fourth robot icon by spiritcoda, in the fifth by viciousgurl and in the Blade/Lester icon by erniemay.

Crossposts: https://louisedennis.livejournal.com/538260.html

Long haired woman holding the head of a Pepper robot in a pose reminiscent of the classic `Alas, poor Yoric' pose.

ShefRobotics bought a Pepper robot to Cheltenham Science Festival as a telepresence demo. Sadly it wasn't quite up to the wear and tear endless school parties can inflict and something went wrong with its neck joint. It's head was duly removed to see if it could be fixed, with the inevitable consequence for photo ops.

Also this week, there was a meme that involved googling yourself+doctor who and picking the first gif that appeared. It must be said I added "gif" to the search terms in order to avoid getting lots of my own Random Doctor Who pictures and ended up with the below which amuses if nothing else.

Leela looking resigned and fed up.

Crossposts: https://louisedennis.livejournal.com/530747.html

We had a successful day, mind you, about which I may blog in due course.

Incidentally, I've always quite fancied doing one of those question memes except that my life doesn't work in a way where I can say "pick a day next month on which you would like me to answer your question in a blog post." On the other hand I can manage, "leave me a question and I'll answer it in a blog post in my own sweet time." Since the whole Doctor Who rewatch is on hiatus until we can figure out a way to watch Blink which doesn't involve NLSS Child refusing to take a shower ever again (see last post) I thought it might be fun to fill the gap with question answers so, you know, ask away!!

NB. I do not promise to answer everything but I'll give anything that doesn't seem overly embarrassing or personal a shot.

Crossposts: http://louisedennis.livejournal.com/280231.html

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A Sub-genre of Postdocs in Hard Hats

Robot Icons

Alas, Poor Pepper

Why yes, it was cold in Sheffield Robotics Lab yesterday.

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May 2025

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