Meet the researchers: Maria Vittoria Minniti

Maria Vittoria Minniti is a PhD student within RSL, ETH Zurich. She is working in the field of control for mobile manipulation applied on underactuated robots.

Position within the NCCR: PhD student at the Robotic Systems Lab

What is the main question that your research tries to answer?

In my PhD research, I try to enhance mobile manipulation capabilities for underactuated robots. In particular, underactuated mobile manipulators (e.g., quadrupedal robots or inverted pendulums) have the potential to be more agile and effective than fully actuated manipulators, i.e. fixed-base robotic arms. However, their control is more challenging and still offers many open research questions, such as how to allow these systems to plan for both manipulation and balancing tasks.

What is your background? What did you study at university?

I have a bachelor degree in Industrial Engineering and a master degree in Robotics and Automation Engineering.

What do you most enjoy about working in the field of robotics?

Robotics is a multi-disciplinary field that lets you gain experience in many interesting engineering areas, such as programming, electronics, mechanics, mathematics, etc…

What does a typical day look like for you?

A typical day involves programming and doing hardware tests. Both the tasks must be performed very carefully, to avoid damaging the robot when deploying your code. Hardware tests are challenging, but they are also very enjoyable because you get the thrill of experiencing for real how your algorithms perform on a real machine.

There are many directions that a PhD in robotics can take you, do you know yet which route you want to follow?

I would like to continue doing research in the field of robotics, either in Academia or in industry.

Many people are nervous about robotics and its future in society – do you share this concern?

Robots have a great potential to help people in disaster situations, such as earthquakes or during a pandemics, or in construction tasks. Their employment in such scenarios will definitely have a positive impact for future society.

Would you have any advice for someone who wanted to follow the same career path?

My advice is to work and study hard, and try to be open-minded towards all different engineering areas.

Finally, what do you do when you’re not hard at work in the lab?

I have many hobbies, in particular running, hiking and playing tennis. I also enjoy cooking and reading.

This portrait is inspired by the #NCCRWoman campaign, which introduces you to a different woman working in research at a Swiss National Center of Competence in research.