The rich heritage of Antal Bejczy

Prof. Bejczy is recognized globally for his achievements as a scientist and engineer, he made fundamental contributions to robot modeling and developed new applications. One domain of robotics stands out of his carrier, space robotics. He joined the NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in 1969, where he developed the first dynamic model of robotic manipulators based on the Lagrangian formulation. Next, he moved to the field of teleoperation, where he was involved with the development of a number of prototypes aimed at achieving full telepresence in space as well as undersea. He pioneered the development of several innovative robot components such as “smart hands” with “smart sensors” and a novel telerobotic system, using a general-purpose force-reflecting hand controller for remote robot arm control, which contributed to the birth of haptics research. HE was present at the birth of first robotic telesurgery systems, and the telerobotics and haptics results got integrated to a pioneering system, the RAMS surgical robot. He trained and mentored a generation of researchers and engineers, and his heritage continues to inspire many.