Research Symposium

25th annual Undergraduate Research Symposium, April 1, 2025

Nikki Zahedi Poster Session 1: 9:30 am - 10:30 am/ Poster #186


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BIO


Hi, my name is Nikki Zahedi and Im from Boca Raton, Florida. During UROP, I worked on a project with Dr.Shoele, where we looked at a soft robotic fish and how reinforcement learning algorithms helped model and train the robot through various environments. After my undergrad, I plan on going to graduate school for either computer science or computational mathematics.

Soft Robotic Fish

Authors: Nikki Zahedi, Kourosh Shoele
Student Major: Computer Science
Mentor: Kourosh Shoele
Mentor's Department: Mechanical Engineering
Mentor's College: College of Engineering
Co-Presenters:

Abstract


We want to understand and explore the effects of reinforcement learning algorithms on the movements and propulsions of a soft robotic fish. More specifically, in environments not suitable for rigid, segmented robots.
Soft robots are challenging due to the infinite degrees of freedom possible, and ML algorithms aim to train that in this study.
Research conditions causing different tail maneuvers, to better understand how RL adapts to complex soft-robot dynamics.
Our goal is to contribute to aquatic research and prosthetic models used for underwater exploration by improving soft-robot locomotion.
Aim to advance robot control with Deep Reinforcement Learning (DRL) agents for soft robots, as they have shown promise in walking swimming, etc. in simulations. Traditional robots implement ODEs, but PDEs are deemed more appropriate, and thus used to model the robots movements for soft robots.

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Keywords: Soft robot fish reinforcement learning