ARPA-E held workshop on "Digital Transportation" on April 26-27, 2016 in the San Francisco Bay Area. The workshop convened leading experts in telecommunications, virtual presence, game design/entertainment, robotics, and human factors technologies to identify innovative research and development paths for advanced telepresence and telelabor technologies. Participants will lend their expertise to help set technical performance and cost targets that will define a successful research program and explore novel technology pathways. 

ARPA-E is interested in telepresence and telelabor technologies that allow the user to accomplish one or more of: (1) communication (convey or consume information), (2) labor (physically affect the environment), and (3) experience; without the need to be physically present.  This would allow users to avoid passenger transportation, reducing energy use and increasing energy efficiency of presence.  Areas of interest and targeted outcomes include, but are not limited to: 

• Identification of potential program metrics that will result in a compelling solutions, but that are also realistic for an ARPA-E program
• Telecommunication: identification of a realistic set of challenges to overcoming the “uncanny valley” issue.  These challenges might include gaze, microexpressions, lighting, body gestures, immersion, 3D audio and video, amongst others
• Telelabor: identification of the cost, payload, and level of precision and autonomy necessary for low-cost manipulator technologies
• Identification and prioritization of the required system capabilities to drive significant adoption
• Identification of ideal testing paradigms and compelling, representative user cases
• Identification of effective metrics for usability and acceptance studies
• Identification of other innovative telepresence technologies that meet the objective of increasing the efficiency of presence through reduced need for passenger transportation

Tuesday, 4/26

Wednesday, 4/27