Black In Robotics National Directors
Dr. Ayanna Howard
Academic Co-Lead
Professor Howard is the Chair of the School of Interactive Computing at Georgia Institute of Technology and the Founder and CTO of Zyrobotics. Professor Howard leads the Human-Automation Systems Lab, and her research is centered around applying human-inspired techniques to intelligent systems. She has also done significant work in improving robotics education for students of all ages: from childhood all the way to graduate-level education.
Dr. Monroe Kennedy III
Academic Co-Lead
Dr. Kennedy is an Assistant Professor in the Mechanical Engineering Department at Stanford University. Prof. Kennedy leads the Assistive Robotics and Manipulation Lab at Stanford University where he develops intelligent robotic systems that can assist humans in tasks by improving the robots capability of perceiving and modeling environments to predict system processes and understand their assistive role.
Maynard Holliday, MSc.
Industry Co-Lead
Mr. Maynard Holliday is the Director of Defense Research and Engineering for Modernization (DDRE(M)). In this capacity, he oversees investment and capability analysis of the Pentagon's modernization priorities outlined in the National Defense Strategy. He has oversight of the 11 principal directors assigned to those modernization portfolios and their roadmaps — the comprehensive strategies to manage, provide oversight and guide choices for each modernization priority area. These modernization priorities include 5G; Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning; Autonomy; Biotechnology; Cyber; Directed Energy; Fully Networked Command, Control, and Communications; Hypersonics; Microelectronics; Quantum Science; and Space.
Mr. Holliday has over 30 years of professional experience leading technological innovations, in both government and the private sector. Most recently, he was a Senior Engineer at the RAND Corporation working on autonomous vehicle safety metrics and policy, explainable artificial intelligence, swarm robotics, and drone defense. He is also Co-Founder of Robot Garden, the robotics-themed hacker space in Livermore, California.
Mr. Holliday graduated from Carnegie Mellon University in 1984 with a Bachelor of Science in Mechanical Engineering. He later won a scholarship to attend Stanford University where he earned a Master of Science in Mechanical Engineering Design, with an emphasis on robotics, international security, and arms control. Mr. Holliday also won a scholarship to attend the International Space University in France and was a two-time finalist for the U.S. Astronaut Corp.
Dr. Edward Tunstel
Industry Co-Lead
Dr. Tunstel is the CTO at Motiv Space Systems, Inc./Motiv Robotics, prior to which he was an Associate Director and Group Leader for Robotics at Raytheon Technologies Research Center, a Senior Roboticist and Space Robotics Lead at Johns Hopkins APL, and a Senior Robotics Engineer at NASA JPL. He maintains expertise in robotic autonomy and intelligent systems for field and service domain applications with research interests including mobile robot navigation, autonomous control, cooperative and human-collaborative robotics, robotic systems engineering, and soft computing applications to autonomous systems.
Dr. Carlotta Berry
Undergraduate Academic Lead
Carlotta Berry, Ph.D., is a Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering at Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology. Prof. Berry helped found and co-directs both the Rose Building Undergraduate Diversity (ROSE-BUD) program and the multidisciplinary robotics program. Her research focuses on educational mobile robotics, enhanced human-robot interfaces, and recruitment and retention activities for underrepresented populations in electrical and computer engineering.
Dr. Sophia Williams
Industry Co-Lead
Sophia R. Williams received her B.S. from Harvey Mudd College in 2015 and her M.S. and Ph.D. from Stanford University in 2019 and 2021, respectively. Her research interests include medical robotics, haptic interfaces, design, robotics, and human-robot interaction. Sophia is a recipient of the National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship, Stanford Robotics Center fellowship sponsored by FANUC, and Watson Fellowship. She currently works in medical robotics at Auris Health as a Sr. Software and Controls Engineer.