{"692835":{"#nid":"692835","#data":{"type":"event","title":"PhD Proposal by Zhigen Zhao","body":[{"value":"\u003Cp\u003E\u003Cstrong\u003ETitle:\u003C\/strong\u003E Toward Generalizable, Scalable, and Experience-Driven Robot Autonomy: From TAMP to Embodied Agents\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u003Cstrong\u003EDate:\u003C\/strong\u003E Tuesday, October 6th, 2026\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u003Cstrong\u003ETime:\u003C\/strong\u003E\u0026nbsp;3:00 PM - 4:30 PM EDT\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u003Cstrong\u003ELocation:\u003C\/strong\u003E\u0026nbsp;MRDC 3515\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u003Cstrong\u003EZoom:\u0026nbsp;\u003C\/strong\u003E\u003Ca href=\u0022https:\/\/nam12.safelinks.protection.outlook.com\/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fgatech.zoom.us%2Fj%2F96846452330%3Fpwd%3DoGfmTGbPoLo2zyp5ulwGl9PjECLl0Y.1\u0026amp;data=05%7C02%7Cannouncements%40grad.gatech.edu%7Ca720930b73ed45d292d608df1b1034ec%7C482198bbae7b4b258b7a6d7f32faa083%7C1%7C0%7C639259428559105626%7CUnknown%7CTWFpbGZsb3d8eyJFbXB0eU1hcGkiOnRydWUsIlYiOiIwLjAuMDAwMCIsIlAiOiJXaW4zMiIsIkFOIjoiTWFpbCIsIldUIjoyfQ%3D%3D%7C0%7C%7C%7C\u0026amp;sdata=dhDBqHY5PPbXxORqNQ3jBD5jXY%2FMqwZKSPVAxTk%2Fobw%3D\u0026amp;reserved=0\u0022\u003E\u003Cstrong\u003Ehttps:\/\/gatech.zoom.us\/j\/96846452330?pwd=oGfmTGbPoLo2zyp5ulwGl9PjECLl0Y.1\u003C\/strong\u003E\u003C\/a\u003E\u003Cstrong\u003E\u0026nbsp;\u003C\/strong\u003E\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u0026nbsp;\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EZhigen Zhao\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EPh.D. Student\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EInstitute for Robotics \u0026amp; Intelligent Machines\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EGeorgia Institute of Technology\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u0026nbsp;\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u003Cstrong\u003ECommittee members\u003C\/strong\u003E\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u0026nbsp;\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EDr. Ye Zhao (advisor): Woodruff School of Mechanical Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EDr. Jiachen Li: School of Industrial and Systems Engineering and Woodruff School of Mechanical Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EDr. Shreyas Kousik: Woodruff School of Mechanical Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EDr. Sonia Chernova: School of Interactive Computing, Georgia Institute of Technology\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EDr. Shiqi Zhang: School of Computing, Binghamton University, State University of New York\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u0026nbsp;\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u003Cstrong\u003EAbstract\u003C\/strong\u003E\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u0026nbsp;\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003ERobots deployed in unstructured, human-centric environments must carry out long-horizon tasks that couple discrete decisions with contact-rich continuous motion. Task and Motion Planning (TAMP) addresses this by decomposing the problem into a discrete task plan and a continuous motion plan, but classical TAMP requires re-engineering for each new task or environment, scales poorly with problem size and horizon, and accumulates no experience across deployments.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u0026nbsp;\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EThis proposal builds toward generalizable, scalable, and experience-driven robot autonomy by progressively replacing the hand-engineered layers of classical TAMP with learning-based counterparts. First, we formulate TAMP as a single bilevel optimization that couples symbolic search with dynamics-consistent motion and remains scalable by exploiting task structure. Second, we move this optimization offline and learn fast, robust motion policies by imitation, supported by cross-platform teleoperation and egocentric data infrastructure and by a discrete action representation that makes multi-task policies steerable at inference time. Finally, we propose an embodied agent system and an agent memory evaluation benchmark in which an LLM\/VLM orchestrates VLA skills and a self-evolving multimodal memory accumulates verified experience across deployments, enabling the robot to continually self-improve from its own experience without retraining.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u0026nbsp;\u003C\/p\u003E","summary":"","format":"limited_html"}],"field_subtitle":"","field_summary":[{"value":"\u003Cp\u003EToward Generalizable, Scalable, and Experience-Driven Robot Autonomy: From TAMP to Embodied Agents\u003C\/p\u003E","format":"limited_html"}],"field_summary_sentence":[{"value":"Toward Generalizable, Scalable, and Experience-Driven Robot Autonomy: From TAMP to Embodied Agents"}],"uid":"27707","created_gmt":"2026-09-25 18:22:27","changed_gmt":"2026-09-25 18:22:58","author":"Tatianna Richardson","boilerplate_text":"","field_publication":"","field_article_url":"","field_event_time":{"event_time_start":"2026-10-06T15:00:00-04:00","event_time_end":"2026-10-06T16:30:15-04:00","event_time_end_last":"2026-10-06T16:30:15-04:00","gmt_time_start":"2026-10-06 19:00:00","gmt_time_end":"2026-10-06 20:30:15","gmt_time_end_last":"2026-10-06 20:30:15","rrule":null,"timezone":"America\/New_York"},"location":"MRDC 3515","extras":[],"groups":[{"id":"221981","name":"Graduate Studies"}],"categories":[],"keywords":[{"id":"102851","name":"Phd proposal"}],"core_research_areas":[],"news_room_topics":[],"event_categories":[{"id":"1788","name":"Other\/Miscellaneous"}],"invited_audience":[{"id":"78771","name":"Public"}],"affiliations":[],"classification":[],"areas_of_expertise":[],"news_and_recent_appearances":[],"phone":[],"contact":[],"email":[],"slides":[],"orientation":[],"userdata":""}}}