IEEE RoboSoft Half-day Workshop
When: April 2026
Where: Room TBC, Kanazawa, Japan
Calls for Contributions
TBC
Workshop Summary
For robots that rely on embodied intelligence, fluids play a central role in shaping the brain (controller), body, and environment. While soft robotics depend on fluids for actuation, sensing, and interaction, the role of fluids in shaping intelligent behavior have been underexplored and have been treated as a passive component rather than an active component of intelligence. To advance the soft robotics field, we must understand how fluids can act as a basic ingredient for intelligence that gives rise to emergent and complex, but adaptive and efficient behavior. This workshop aims to unite researchers across soft robotics, fluid mechanics, biology, and embodied AI to define a framework of Fluid Embodied Intelligence (FEI) and move beyond application-driven research. We instead aim to fundamentally understand how fluids shape intelligence through its nonlinearity, physical computation within, and emergent behaviors.
Program at a Glance (Tentative)
All times are in Japan Standard time.
| 8:15 – 8:45 | Registration & setup | |
| 8:45 – 9:00 | Workshop start & introduction | Organizers |
| 9:00 – 10:00 | Brain, Body or Environment Micro-talks: Session 1 10-minute talks from experts with 2-3 minutes Q&A | Speakers: TBC |
| 10:00 – 10:15 | Young Researcher Talks 5-minutes each | Speakers: TBC |
| 10:15 – 10:45 | Breakout Sessions | Everyone |
| 10:45 – 11:15 | Coffee break & posters | |
| 11:15 – 12:15 | Brain, Body or Environment Micro-talks: Session 2 10-minute talks from experts with 2-3 minutes Q&A | Speakers: TBC |
| 12:15 – 12:45 | Breakout Sessions | Everyone |
| 12:45 – 13:00 | Concluding Remarks by Organizers | Everyone |
Invited Speakers
Timetable
All times are in Japan Standard time.
8:45 – Welcome & Intro
9:00 – Speaker 1: “TBC”
9:15 – Speaker 2: “TBC”
9:30 – Speaker 3: “TBC”
9:45 – Speaker 4: “TBC”
9:45 – Speaker 5: “TBC”
10:00 – Young Researcher Talks from invited early-career researchers and students
Speakers: “TBC“
10:15 – Breakout Sessions: Brain, Body, Environment Discussion
10:45 – Coffee break & Poster session
List of Posters:
Presenters: “TBC“
11:15 – Speaker 6: “TBC”
11:30 – Speaker 7: “TBC”
11:45 – Speaker 8: “TBC”
12:00 – Speaker 9: “TBC”
12:00 – Speaker 10: “TBC”
12:15 – Breakout Sessions: Brain, Body, Environment Discussion
12:45 – Discussion, Next Steps, & Wrap-up
Organizers
- Nana Obayashi, New York University, USA
- Dr. Kyle Walker, EPFL, Switzerland
- Guanran Pei, EPFL, Switzerland
- Saba Firouznia, University of Cambridge, UK
- Wenzhong Yan, UC Davis, USA
- Prof. Josie Hughes, EPFL, Switzerland
- Prof. Rebecca Kramer-Bottiglio, Yale University, USA
- Prof. Fumiya Iida, University of Tokyo, Japan
