Pieter Jonker
Papers
38
Total Citations
1,306
H-Index
15
About
Pieter Jonker is a versatile robotics researcher whose work spans socially assistive robotics, reinforcement learning-based control, and intelligent robot perception. He is perhaps best known for his influential contributions to the field of care robotics, particularly his 2010 systematic review on socially assistive robots in elderly care, which has accumulated over 577 citations and helped establish the evidence base for deploying robots in geriatric settings. His subsequent studies on the therapeutic robot Paro in psychogeriatric care further cemented his reputation as a leading voice in human-robot interaction for vulnerable populations. Beyond care robotics, Jonker has made significant contributions to robot learning and locomotion, developing reinforcement learning frameworks for real-time dynamic systems and bipedal walking robots, addressing the practical challenge of control delay in physical systems. His work on the LEO bipedal robot exemplifies his commitment to bridging theoretical RL with real-world hardware constraints. Additionally, Jonker has advanced robot perception through extremum seeking control for active vision, enabling robots to autonomously optimize viewpoints for object recognition and grasping in unstructured environments. Together, his diverse portfolio reflects a career dedicated to making robots more adaptive, intelligent, and genuinely useful across both healthcare and industrial domains.
Research Focus
Key Achievements
Top Papers
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- 3Towards Behavior Design of a 3D-Printed Soft Robotic Hand61 citations · 2016
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- 9Grasping of unknown objects via curvature maximization using active vision34 citations · 2011
- 10Comparison of extremum seeking control algorithms for robotic applications33 citations · 2012