Tony Prescott

I am a Professor of Cognitive Neuroscience at the University of Sheffield and Director of Sheffield Robotics a cross-disciplinary collaborative enterprise involving both Universities in Sheffield.

My primary research goal is to understand natural intelligence, in animals and humans, and to use this understanding to create life-like intelligent robots. With my collaborators, I have created a variety of biomimetic robotic systems, including the whiskered robots Scratchbot and Shrewbot, exploration strategies and autobiographical memory systems for the humanoid iCub robot, and wearable sensory substitution systems. I am involved in a number of commercial projects to develop novel assistive and companion robots. I believe that developers of disruptive technologies should think carefully about the potential societal impacts of their work. In 2012, I led a European working group on the societal impacts of robotics and since then have been actively investigating ethical and societal issues raised by robotics, artificial intelligence, virtual reality and telepresence.