John M. Hollerbach

John Matthew Hollerbach is a professor of computer science and research professor of mechanical engineering at the University of Utah. He is the editor of The International Journal of Robotics Research, a Senior Editor of Presence: Teleoperators & Virtual Environments, and a Governing Board member of the electronic journal Haptics-e.

Early life and education Hollerbach was born in Marktheidenfeld, Germany to Hungarian refugees who met and married in a displacement camp. He and his family lived in a priest's attic in Germany for five years before emigrating to Detroit as refugees.

He received his BS in chemistry in 1968 from the University of Michigan but was interested in the growing computer industry and spent an extra year taking computer science courses to receive an MS in mathematics. In 1982, Hollerbach co-produced a robot motion sourcebook with J. Michael Brady, Matthew T. Mason, Tomas Lozano-Perez, and Timothy Johnson. The book contained sections on dynamics, trajectory planning, compliance and force control, feedback control, and spatial planning; each section had a substantial introduction that served as a tutorial in addition to research papers by 19 top robotics researchers, including Marc Raibert, Robin Popplestone, and Pat Ambler. An updated version of the sourcebook was published in 1989 edited by J. Michael Brady. In 1983, Hollerbach helped start the International Journal of Robotics Research and the International Symposium of Robotics Research. The project began in 1981 and was completed in 1987. The hand design consisted of a 16-joint four-finger manipulator that used 32 artificial tendons sensing via the Hall effect. 12 copies were made for use in a variety of contexts. At the NYU Courant Institute of Mathematical Sciences, Ken Perlin, James Demmel, and Paul K. Wright obtained a copy to build simulation software for the hand. Carnegie Mellon University, Columbia University, University of Rochester and other university research labs obtained copies to explore multi-agent control, teleoperation, and apprenticeship learning.

Medical robotics In 1989 Hollerbach left MIT and accepted a NSERC/CIFAR Industrial Chair at McGill University. He hired Martin Buehler as a Junior Chair and formed a joint laboratory with Ian Hunter to work on fundamental actuator design.

Awards 1984 National Science Foundation Presidential Young Investigator Award 1988 Fellow of the Canadian Institute for Advanced Research 1996 Fellow of the Institute for Electrical and Electronics Engineers 2012 IEEE Robotics and Automation Society Distinguished Service Award

Selected publications Hierarchical Shape Descriptions of Objects by Selection and Modification of Prototypes (Scientiæ Magister thesis), The Artificial Intelligence Laboratory, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge MA, AI-TR-346 of 1976. [The thesis offers (first) a theory of block-world descriptions focused on protrusions and indentations, and (second) a theory of generalized cylinder descriptions specialized to Greek vases.]