Papers
147
Total Citations
8,383
H-Index
44
About
Aaron M. Dollar is a prominent robotics researcher whose work has fundamentally shaped the fields of robotic grasping, manipulation, and benchmarking. Best known for co-creating the Yale-CMU-Berkeley (YCB) Object and Model Set, Dollar established a common standard for evaluating robotic manipulation systems — a contribution that has generated over 1,500 combined citations across multiple publications and transformed how researchers compare and validate their work. His expertise spans compliant and underactuated robotic hand design, most notably the iRobot-Harvard-Yale (iHY) Hand, which demonstrated that durable, affordable, and moderately dexterous manipulation was achievable without complex actuation schemes. Dollar's open-source 3D-printed hand design further democratized manipulation research by making advanced hardware accessible to labs worldwide. Equally significant is his empirical work analyzing human grasping behavior in real-world settings, providing data-driven insights that inform both robotic and prosthetic hand design. His research bridges fundamental human factors analysis with practical engineering solutions, creating tools and datasets — from RGB-D object libraries to UAV stability studies — that continue to serve as essential resources across robotics, rehabilitation engineering, and human-robot interaction research communities.
Research Focus
Key Achievements
Top Papers
- 1
- 2A compliant, underactuated hand for robust manipulation597 citations · 2014
- 3
- 4Yale-CMU-Berkeley dataset for robotic manipulation research373 citations · 2017
- 5
- 6A modular, open-source 3D printed underactuated hand254 citations · 2013
- 7Grasp Frequency and Usage in Daily Household and Machine Shop Tasks244 citations · 2013
- 8A robust compliant grasper via shape deposition manufacturing232 citations · 2006
- 9
- 10Analysis of Human Grasping Behavior: Object Characteristics and Grasp Type199 citations · 2014