Institut des Systèmes Intelligents
et de Robotique

NEWS

Promotion to director of research by the Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS), 1 October 2020

It is with great pleasure that I learned that I have been promoted to director of research by the Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS). I'll continue working in the same research institute, with new possibilities and directions now open for the researches of our group.

 

NEWS

Tenth International Symposium on Biology of Decision Making, Paris, France, 27-29 May 2020 (postponed to 2021 due to the pandemics)

The tenth international symposium on the biology of decision-making will take place in Paris, France on May 27-29th 2020. It is co-organised by Kenji Doya, Roeland Heerema, Mehdi Khamassi, Etienne Koechlin, Fanny Lachat, Marine Magne and Mathias Pessiglione. Invited speakers from different countries (USA, UK, Europe, Japon) will present different approaches (ethology, economical, neural, psychological, philosophical, robotic/AI and computational approaches) to decision making.

More information here: https://sbdm2020.sciencesconf.org

 

NEWS

François Cinotti's PhD defense @ Sorbonne Université, 8 July 2019

François Cinotti, PhD candidate that I co-supervised with Benoît Girard at l'Ecole Doctorale Cerveau Cognition Comportement, has defended his thesis on 8 July 2019 at Sorbonne Université. His thesis is entitled "Computational modelling of the variability and regulation of reinforcement learning and the associated dopaminergic signalling in Rats".

 

NEWS

Nineth International Symposium on Biology of Decision Making, Oxford, UK, 27-29 May 2019

The nineth international symposium on the biology of decision-making took place in Oxford, UK, on May 27-29th 2019. It was co-organised by Dan Bang, Andrew Bell, Alessandro Bongioanni, Thomas Boraud, Kenji Doya, Neil Garrett, Mehdi Khamassi, Miriam Klein-Flügge, Etienne Koechlin, Nils Kolling, Patricia Lockwood, Alizée Lopez-Persem, Jill O'Reilly, Mathias Pessiglione, Matthew Rushworth, Jérôme Sallet, Hannah Sheaha, Chris Summerfield, Mark Walton and Marco Wittmann. Invited speakers from different countries (USA, UK, Europe, Japon) presented different approaches (ethology, economics, neural, behavioral and computational approaches) to decision-making.

More information here: http://sbdm2019.isir.upmc.fr/

 

NEWS

Best late breaking report award (Nanjing City Prize) at IEEE RO-MAN 2018, Nanjing, China, 27 August 2018

Khamassi, M. and Chalvatzaki, G. and Tsitsimis, T. and Velentzas, G. and Tzafestas, C. (2018). A framework for robot learning during child-robot interaction with human engagement as reward signal.
Proceedings of the 27th IEEE International Symposium on Robot and Human Interactive Communication (RO-MAN 2018). Pages 461-464. Nanjing City Prize for Best Late Breaking Report.

Download the PDF

 

NEWS

Eighth International Symposium on Biology of Decision Making, Paris, France, 21-23 May 2018

The eighth international symposium on the biology of decision-making took place in Paris, France on May 21-23th 2018. It was co-organised by Kenji Doya, Roeland Heerema, Mehdi Khamassi, Etienne Koechlin, Fanny Lachat, Marine Magne and Mathias Pessiglione. Invited speakers from different countries (USA, UK, Europe, Japon) presented different approaches (ethology, economical, neural and computational approaches) to decision making.

More information here: http://sbdm2018.isir.upmc.fr/

 

NEWS

Thibaud Griessinger's PhD defense @ ENS, 18 December 2017

Thibaud Griessinger, PhD candidate that I co-supervised with Giorgio Coricelli at l'Ecole Doctorale Cerveau Cognition Comportement and funded by Ecole Normale Supérieure, has defended his thesis on 18 December 2017 at l'ENS. His thesis is entitled "The cognitive roots of strategic learning in repeated social interactions - from cognitive neuroscience back to behavioral economics".

 

NEWS

Nassim Aklil's PhD defense @ UPMC, 27 September 2017

Nassim Aklil, PhD candidate that I co-supervised with Benoît Girard and Ludovic Denoyer at l'Ecole Doctorale Cerveau Cognition Comportement and funded by Labex SMART, has defended his thesis on 27 September 2017 at ISIR, UPMC. His thesis is entitled "Apprentissage actif sous contrainte de budget en robotique et en neurosciences computationnelles - Localisation robotique et modélisation comportementale en environnement non stationnaire". Nassim now works in the private sector.

 

NEWS

Seventh International Symposium on Biology of Decision Making, Paris, France, 14-16 May 2017

The seventh international symposium on the biology of decision-making took place in Bordeaux, France on May 14-16th 2017. It was co-organised by Thomas Boraud, Sacha Bourgeois-Gironde, Kenji Doya, Mehdi Khamassi, Etienne Koechlin, Mathias Pessiglione and Nicolas Rougier. Invited speakers from different countries (USA, UK, Europe, Japon) presented different approaches (ethology, economical, neural and computational approaches) to decision making.

More information here: http://sbdm2017.isir.upmc.fr/

 

NEWS

Invited Researcher at the Department of Experimental Psychology, University of Oxford, UK, 2017

Since 2017, I have been an invited researcher at the Department of Experimental Psychology of the University of Oxford, UK. There I mainly collaborate with Jérôme Sallet, Matthew Rushworth, Chris Summerfield and Mark Walton, partly thanks to the support of the Mission for Interdisciplinarity of the CNRS. 

 

NEWS

Guillaume Viejo's PhD defense @ UPMC, 28 November 2016

Guillaume Viejo, PhD candidate that I co-supervised with Benoît Girard at the Brain Cognition & Behavior doctoral school (ED3C) and funded by B2V, has defended his thesis on 28 November 2016 at ISIR, UPMC. His thesis is entitled "Coordination de systèmes de mémoire : modèles théoriques du comportement animal et humain". Guillaume is now post-doc with Adrien Peyrache at Montréal University.

 

NEWS

Erwan Renaudo's PhD defense @ UPMC, 6 June 2016

Erwan Renaudo, PhD candidate that I co-supervised with Raja Chatila and Benoît Girard at the EDITE Doctoral School and funded by DGA, has defended his thesis on 6 June 2016 at ISIR, UPMC. His thesis is entitled "Des comportements flexibles aux comportements habituels : meta-apprentissage neuro-inspiré pour la robotique autonome". Erwan is now post-doc at Innsbruck University.

 

NEWS

Sixth International Symposium on Biology of Decision Making, Paris, France, 25-27 May 2016

The sixth international symposium on the biology of decision-making took place between Ecole Normale Supérieure, Institut du Cerveau et de la Moelle and Université Pierre et Marie Curie in Paris, France on May 25-27th 2016. It was co-organised by Thomas Boraud, Kenji Doya, Mehdi Khamassi, Etienne Koechlin, Marine Magne, Natacha Logerot, Delphine Oudiette and Mathias Pessiglione. Invited speakers from different countries (USA, UK, Europe, Japon) presented different approaches (ethology, economical, neural and computational approaches) to decision making.

More information here: http://sbdm2016.isir.upmc.fr/

 

NEWS

Invited Researcher at the Robotics Laboratory, National Technical University of Athens, Greece, 2016-2017

Since January 2016, I have been an invited researcher at the Robotics Laboratory of the National Technical University of Athens, Greece. There I mainly collaborate with Costas Tzafestas within the frame of the European project "Baby Robot".

 

NEWS

Jean Bellot's PhD defense @ UPMC, 7 July 2015

Jean Bellot, PhD candidate that I co-supervised with Benoît Girard at the Brain Cognition & Behavior doctoral school (ED3C) and funded by Ville de Paris, has defended his thesis on July 7th 2015 at ISIR, UPMC. His thesis is entitled "Modélisation computationnelle du rôle de la dopamine dans les boucles cortico-striatales dans l'apprentissage et la régulation de la sélection de l'action".

 

NEWS

Fifth International Symposium on Biology of Decision Making, Paris, France, 11-13 May 2015

The fifth symposium on the biology of decision-making took place between Ecole Normale Supérieure, Institut du Cerveau et de la Moelle and Université Pierre et Marie Curie in Paris, France on May 11-13th 2015. It was co-organised by Bastien Blain, Sacha Bourgeois-Gironde, Thomas Boraud, Kenji Doya, Mehdi Khamassi, Etienne Koechlin, Alizée Lopez-Persem, Marine Magne and Mathias Pessiglione. Invited speakers from different countries (USA, UK, Europe, Japon) presented different approaches (ethology, economical, neural and computational approaches) to decision making.

More information here: http://sbdm2015.isir.upmc.fr/

 

NEWS

Associate Editor @ Frontiers in Neurorobotics, April 2015

I have joined the Editorial Board of the journal Frontiers in Neurorobotics as Associate Editor. The journal will obtain an impact factor which will be announcezd during the Summer 2015.

More info here: http://www.frontiersin.org/Neurorobotics

 

NEWS

Florian Lesaint's PhD defense @ UPMC, 26 September 2014

Florian Lesaint, Phd candidate that I co-supervised with Olivier Sigaud at the EDITE doctoral school and funded by the Ministry of Higher Education and Research, has obtained his thesis on September 26th 2014 at ISIR, UPMC. His thesis is entitled "Modelling animal conditioning with factored representations in dual-learning systems - Explaining inter-individual differences at behavioural and neurophysiological levels" can be downloaded here in pdf.

 

NEWS

Fourth International Symposium on Biology of Decision Making, Paris, France, 26-28 May 2014

The fourth symposium on the biology of decision-making took place between Ecole Normale Supérieure, Institut du Cerveau et de la Moelle and Université Pierre et Marie Curie in Paris, France. It has been co-organised by Sacha Bourgeois-Gironde, Thomas Boraud, Kenji Doya, Mehdi Khamassi, Etienne Koechlin, Alizée Lopez-Persem, Marine Magne, Mathias Pessiglione and Lionel Rigoux. Invited speakers from different countries (USA, UK, Europe, Japon) presented different approaches (ethology, economical, neural and computational approaches) to decision making.

More information here: http://sbdm2014.isir.upmc.fr/

 

NEWS

HDR defense @ UPMC, 6 May 2014

I have defended my Habilitation to Direct Researches entitled "Coordination of parallel learning processes in animals and robots" on May 6th 2014 at ISIR, UPMC.

Click here to download the pdf file of my HDR.

 

NEWS

Participation to the editorial board of Intellectica, January 2014

I have joined the editorial board of the Intellectica journal, which is concerned by the ensemble of disciplines interested in the study of cognition. Intellectica published theoretical work as well as original experimental work. It also publishes syntheses, research reports, critical notes and historical perspectives.

More info here: http://intellectica.org/en/Home/

 

NEWS

Invited Researcher at the Center for Mind/Brain Sciences, University of Trento, Italy, 2014-2015

I have been invited researcher at the Center for Mind/Brain Sciences, University of Trento, Italy, in 2014-2015. There I have mainly collaborated with Giorgio Coricelli within the frame of his European ERC project "Transfer Learning Between and Within Brains".

 

NEWS

Third Symposium on Biology of Decision Making, Paris, France, 29-30 May 2013

The third symposium on the biology of decision-making took place at Institut du Cerveau et de la Moelle, in Paris, France. It was co-organised by Sacha Bourgeois-Gironde, Thomas Boraud, Kenji Doya, Mehdi Khamassi, Arnaud Lucas, Mathias Pessiglione, Aurore San-Galli and Vasilisa Skvortsova. Invited speakers from different countries (USA, UK, Europe, Japon) presented different approaches (ethology, economical, neural and computational approaches) to decision making.

More information here: http://sbdm2013.isir.upmc.fr/

 

NEWS

Robotics and Neuroscience Days, ISIR, Paris, France, 29-30 November 2012

The GT8 workgroup of the Robotics GDR is organizing on November 29-30th two "Robotics and Neuroscience" days. These days will take place at ISIR, in Paris. The first day is co-organized with the GDR Neuroscience of Memory and will have the following topics: Learning, conditioning and goal-directed behaviors. The second day is specific to the GDR Robotics but will also gather neurobiologists and roboticists around the topics: Attention and saccadic eye movements.

Registration is free but mandatory by e-mail (see documents below).

Click here to download the program of Day 1 "Learning, conditioning and goal-directed behaviors".

Click here to download the program of Day 2 "Attention and saccadic eye movements".

 

NEWS

Best paper award to Jean Bellot at SAB 2012

Bellot, J. and Sigaud, O. and Khamassi, M. (2012). Which Temporal Difference Learning algorithm best reproduces dopamine activity in a multi-choice task? SAB 2012 Conference.

Download the pdf

 

NEWS

Second Symposium on Biology of Decision Making, Paris, France, 10-11 May 2012

The second symposium on the biology of decision making took place at Institut du Cerveau et de la Moelle, in Paris, France. It was co-organised by ISIR-UPMC. Kenji Doya gave a plenary lecture as an invited professor at Université Pierre et Marie Curie. Other invited speakers presented different approaches (economical, behavioral, neural and computational approaches) to decision making.

More information here: http://sbdm2012.isir.upmc.fr/