Research Labs
University robotics labs, institutes and national research centers publishing the humanoid, manipulation and locomotion research the industry builds on.
UC San Diego Contextual Robotics Institute
UC San Diego institute coordinating robotics research across engineering and cognitive science, including human-centered and safe autonomy work.
AIST
Japan's national research institute whose robotics work includes the HRP humanoid series and the Choreonoid and OpenRTM software tools.
Franka Robotics
Munich maker of the Franka research and industrial arm, popular in university manipulation labs for its torque sensing at every joint.
Northwestern Center for Robotics and Biosystems
Northwestern center researching haptics, human-robot physical interaction and the mechanics of assistive and rehabilitation devices.
EPFL Biorobotics Laboratory
Swiss lab studying animal locomotion and building biomimetic robots such as salamander and quadruped platforms to test the science.
X-Humanoid (Beijing Innovation Center of Human Robotics)
Beijing innovation center developing humanoid platforms and shared embodied-AI infrastructure with public and industry backing.
University of Washington Personal Robotics Lab
Seattle lab researching robots that physically assist people, including robot-assisted feeding and manipulation around humans.
Columbia Robotic Manipulation and Mobility Lab
Columbia University lab researching robot hands, manipulation and assistive robotics.
Pollen Robotics
French maker of Reachy, an open-source humanoid robot for research and developers. The company is now part of Hugging Face.
Tencent Robotics X
Tencent's robotics lab, publishing work on legged robots, dexterous manipulation and an embodied-intelligence platform.
Oregon State Dynamic Robotics and AI Lab
Oregon State lab whose bipedal robots Cassie and Digit came out of research on efficient, agile legged locomotion.
University of Tokyo JSK Robotics Laboratory
Japanese lab with a long history of musculoskeletal and life-sized humanoid robots and whole-body motion research.
UT Austin Human Centered Robotics Laboratory
University of Texas lab researching whole-body control and humanoid systems designed to work safely around people.
Harvard Biodesign Lab
Harvard lab developing soft wearable robots and exosuits that assist walking and arm movement for rehabilitation.
Johns Hopkins Laboratory for Computational Sensing and Robotics
Johns Hopkins robotics center known for medical and surgical robotics, sensing and human-machine collaboration.
Yale GRAB Lab
Yale lab studying grasping and dexterous manipulation, and the source of the open-source Yale OpenHand designs.
Mimic Robotics
ETH Zurich spinoff teaching robot hands dexterous tasks from human demonstration for industrial work.