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About

Scott Heath is a multidisciplinary robotics researcher whose work spans neurobiologically inspired navigation, biorobotics, and social human-robot interaction. He is perhaps best known for his contributions to the OpenRatSLAM project, an open-source brain-based simultaneous localization and mapping system that has garnered over 144 citations and demonstrated how neuroscience principles can drive advances in autonomous robot navigation. Heath also pioneered the iRat (Intelligent Rat Animat Technology) platform, a rat-sized robot designed to study embodied cognition and enable genuine interaction between robots and live rats — opening new frontiers in neuroscience research that would otherwise be ethically or technically prohibitive. Beyond biorobotics, Heath has made meaningful contributions to social robotics, exploring how robots can meaningfully engage with humans — and particularly children — over sustained interactions. His concept of "social moments" offers a theoretical framework for understanding timescale-sensitive social cues in human-robot encounters. His work on child-robot dialogic storytelling and touch pattern visualization further demonstrates a commitment to grounding social robotics in rigorous empirical methodology. Collectively, Heath's research bridges neuroscience, animal behavior, and human-centered robotics, establishing him as a versatile and impactful voice in the field.