Henrik Iskov Christensen (born July 16, 1962 in Frederikshavn, Denmark) is a Danish roboticist and Professor of Computer Science a
Dept. of Computer Science and Engineering
at the UC San Diego Jacobs School of Engineering. He is also the Director of th
Contextual Robotics Institute
at UC San Diego. Prior to UC San Diego, he was a Distinguished Professor of Computer Science in the School of Interactive Computing at the

Georgia Institute of Technology The Georgia Institute of Technology, commonly referred to as Georgia Tech or, in the state of Georgia, as Tech or The Institute, is a public research university and institute of technology in Atlanta, Georgia. Established in 1885, it is part of ...

. At Georgia Tech, Christensen served as the founding director of the Institute for Robotics and Intelligent Machines
IRIM@GT
and the KUKA Chair of Robotics. Previously, Christensen was the Founding Chairman of European Robotics Research Network ( EURON) and an

IEEE The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) is a 501(c)(3) professional association for electronic engineering and electrical engineering (and associated disciplines) with its corporate office in New York City and its operati ...

Robotics and Automation Society Distinguished Lecturer in Robotics.

Biography

Christensen received his Certificate of Apprenticeship in

Mechanical Engineering Mechanical engineering is the study of physical machines that may involve force and movement. It is an engineering branch that combines engineering physics and mathematics principles with materials science, to design, analyze, manufacture, ...

from the Frederikshavn Technical School, Denmark in 1981. He received his

M.Sc. A Master of Science ( la, Magisterii Scientiae; abbreviated MS, M.S., MSc, M.Sc., SM, S.M., ScM or Sc.M.) is a master's degree in the field of science awarded by universities in many countries or a person holding such a degree. In contrast to ...

and

Ph.D. A Doctor of Philosophy (PhD, Ph.D., or DPhil; Latin: or ') is the most common degree at the highest academic level awarded following a course of study. PhDs are awarded for programs across the whole breadth of academic fields. Because it is a ...

in Electrical Engineering from

Aalborg University Aalborg University (AAU) is a Danish public university with campuses in Aalborg, Esbjerg, and Copenhagen founded in 1974. The university awards bachelor's degrees, master's degrees, and PhD degrees in a wide variety of subjects within humanitie ...

in 1987 and 1990, respectively. His doctoral thesis ''Aspects of Real Time Image Sequence Analysis'' was advised by Erik Granum. After receiving his Ph.D., Christensen held teaching and research positions at Aalborg University,

Oak Ridge National Laboratory Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) is a U.S. multiprogram science and technology national laboratory sponsored by the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) and administered, managed, and operated by UT–Battelle as a federally funded research an ...

, and the

Royal Institute of Technology The KTH Royal Institute of Technology ( sv, Kungliga Tekniska högskolan, lit=Royal Institute of Technology), abbreviated KTH, is a public research university in Stockholm, Sweden. KTH conducts research and education in engineering and technol ...

. In 2006, Christensen accepted a part-time position at the

as a Distinguished Professor of Computer Science and the KUKA Chair of Robotics, and transitioned to full-time in early 2007. At Georgia Tech, Christensen served as the founding director of the Center for Robotics and Intelligent Machines (RIM@GT), an interdepartmental research units consists of the College of Computing, College of Engineering, and the

Georgia Tech Research Institute The Georgia Tech Research Institute (GTRI) is the nonprofit applied research arm of the Georgia Institute of Technology in Atlanta, Georgia, United States. GTRI employs around 2,400 people, and is involved in approximately $600 milli ...

(GTRI). During his tenure, RIM@GT experienced an unprecedented growth, including (as of 2008) 36 faculty members as well as a dedicated interdisciplinar
Ph.D. program in Robotics
He joined

UC San Diego The University of California, San Diego (UC San Diego or colloquially, UCSD) is a public land-grant research university in San Diego, California. Established in 1960 near the pre-existing Scripps Institution of Oceanography, UC San Diego is th ...

the fall of 2016 to be the director of the UC San Dieg
Contextual Robotics Institute
The institute does research on robots in the context of empowering people in their daily lives from work over leisure to domestic tasks. An important consideration is the context in which the robot is to perform its tasks.

Research

DARPA Urban Grand Challenge

In 2007, Christensen led Georgia Tech's team in the

DARPA The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) is a research and development agency of the United States Department of Defense responsible for the development of emerging technologies for use by the military. Originally known as the Ad ...

Urban Grand Challenge as the principal investigator. The 2007 UGC was the third installment of the DARPA Grand Challenges (in 2004 and 2005), and took place on November 3, 2007 at the site of the now-closed

George Air Force Base George Air Force Base was a United States Air Force base located within the city limits, 8 miles northwest, of central Victorville, California, about 75 miles northeast of Los Angeles, California. Established by the United States Army Air Co ...

(currently used as

Southern California Logistics Airport Southern California Logistics Airport , also known as Victorville Airport, is a public airport located in the city of Victorville in San Bernardino County, California, approximately north of San Bernardino. Prior to its civil usage, the facilit ...

), in

Victorville Victorville is a city in Victor Valley in San Bernardino County, California. Its population as of the 2020 census was 134,810. History In 1858, Aaron G. Lane came to what is now known as Victorville and founded a waystation called "Lane's Cro ...

California California is a state in the Western United States, located along the Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the most populous U.S. state and the 3rd largest by area. It is also the ...

. The course involved a

urban area An urban area, built-up area or urban agglomeration is a human settlement with a high population density and infrastructure of built environment. Urban areas are created through urbanization and are categorized by urban morphology as cities, ...

course, to be completed in less than 6

hour An hour (symbol: h; also abbreviated hr) is a unit of time conventionally reckoned as of a day and scientifically reckoned between 3,599 and 3,601 seconds, depending on the speed of Earth's rotation. There are 60 minutes in an hour, and 24 ho ...

s while obeying all

traffic Traffic comprises pedestrians, vehicles, ridden or herded animals, trains, and other conveyances that use public ways (roads) for travel and transportation. Traffic laws govern and regulate traffic, while rules of the road include traffi ...

regulations.

Professional activities

* Associate Editor of Journal of Machine Vision and Applications, Springer Verlag (1996–2004). * Associate Editor of

International Journal of Pattern Recognition and Artificial Intelligence The ''International Journal of Pattern Recognition and Artificial Intelligence'' was founded in 1987 and is published by World Scientific. The journal covers developments in artificial intelligence, and its sub-field, pattern recognition. This inc ...

, World Scientific Press (1997–2005) * Associate Editor of MIT Press series on "Intelligent Robotics and Autonomous Agents", (1997–) * Associate Editor of IEEE Transactions on Pattern Analysis and Machine Intelligence (1999–2003) * Associate Editor Robotics and Autonomous Systems journal, Elsevier, Competition Corner, (1999–2002) * Associate Editor of AAAI AI Magazine (2000–2007) * Associate Editor of Springer Series on "Springer Tracts in Advanced Robotics", (2001–) * Associate Editor of International Journal of Robotics Research, (2002–) * Associate Editor of Service Robotics, (2005–)

Patents

* Position Estimation Method, H.I. Christensen & G. Zunino, World patent (WO03062937) 3 March 11, 2008 * Förfarande för en anordning på hjul, G. Zunino & H.I. Christensen, Swedish Patent (SE0200197) Mobile Robot, P. Jensfelt & H.I. Christensen, World Patent.

Honors and awards

* The Foundation Vision North 1991 Research Award. Awarded for contribution to advancement of research at the Laboratory of Image Analysis, Aalborg University. August 1991. * Elected Officer of International Foundation of Robotics Research (2003–) * IEEE RAS Distinguished Lecturer in Robotics (2004–2006) * Engelberger Award for Education (2011)

References

External links

Home page

UC San Diego announcement of Christensen's hire
{{DEFAULTSORT:Christensen, Henrik Iskov 1962 births Living people People from Frederikshavn Roboticists Control theorists Georgia Tech faculty University of California, San Diego faculty Danish scientists Computer vision researchers Aalborg University alumni