Goren Gordon, Ph.D.
Goren Gordon, Ph.D.
Faculty of Engineering; Head of Curiosity Lab
Tel Aviv University
Presentation Title: 
On Curiosity of Robots and Children
Abstract: 
What is curiosity? Can robots be curious? Using neuroscience research of curiosity-driven behavior of animals and robots, a new mathematical model of curiosity has emerged. This model is implemented in robots that learn by themselves about their own body, objects in their environment and people interacting with them. Curious robots can then be used to promote curiosity in children. The same model is used to assess people’s curiosity, with the help of social robots.
Bio: 

Goren Gordon received his B.M.Sc, M.Sc. in physics and M.B.A. at Tel-Aviv University in Israel. His M.Sc. research on wave propagation and scattering was done with Prof. Heyman in the department of Electrical Engineering. His first Ph.D. was in Chemical Physics at the Weizmann Institute of Science, Israel. Gordon researched with Prof. Kurizki dynamical decoherence control of open quantum systems and quantum communication protocols. He also published and developed quantum computer games as an entertaining tool to teach quantum physics. His second Ph.D. was in Computational Neuroscience, also in the Weizmann Institute. Together with Prof. Ahissar he developed novel mathematical models of curiosity and exploration, compared them to animals' behavior and applied them to curious robots. Gordon completed his postdoctoral research in the Personal Robots Group in the Media Lab, MIT, under the supervision of Cynthia Breazeal. He investigated how curious robots can learn to be social by themselves, and how they can assist curious children to learn literacy skills.

Research Interests: 
Machine learning, Social robots, Curiosity assessment

The Henry Samueli School of Engineering

Tel Aviv University