MARBLE, UNIZG-FER Laboratory of Underwater Systems and Technologies (LABUST), and IEEE OES University of Zagreb Student Branch Chapter organized a lecture “Robots for Conservation: Preserving the Human Element” that will be held by Gwendolyn Edgar, PhD researcher at the Queensland University of Technology (QUT) Centre for Robotics.
The lecture will take place on Monday, October 26, 2026, at 12 p.m. at the UNIZG-FER, Grey Hall.
Summary of the lecture
The importance of ocean restoration is highlighted as a vital and urgent issue by leading international organizations around the world. The UN’s Sustainability Goals specify goal 14: “Conserve and sustainably use the oceans, seas and marine resources”. Marine habitats across the world have been experiencing substantial degradation for decades, with research, conservation, and citizen groups alike coming together to try to fight back against his habitat loss. In this talk, I start by presenting results from interviews with conservationists across coral reefs, seagrass meadows, kelp forests, and oyster reefs working in Australia as marine researchers or conservationists. These interviews were aimed at identifying similarities or common needs in disparate workflows as well as determining if there is a good role for robotic assistance in each domain. Based off the interviews, I will present 4 speculative use cases of robotics, showing various morphologies, communication mechanisms, and behaviors. Co-design is an important mechanism for involving multiple stakeholders in defining robots’ roles, embodiments and behaviors. Ethnographic methods allow for an immersion that a controlled environment could not produce, giving deep insights into the daily lives of these conservationists. With a combination of these techniques, more targeted questions can be answered with conservationists about when, where, and how they want robotics assistance, as well as what communication makes sense. Brief insights from these studies will be presented along with notes on active work to address those needs.
Short CV
Gwendolyn Edgar is a PhD researcher at the Queensland University of Technology (QUT) Centre for Robotics working on underwater human robot interaction (U-HRI). They come from a background of software engineering, human robot teaming, and a love of the ocean. Their work focuses on the integration of autonomous underwater vehicles (AUVs) into conservation diver teams. To this end, they pursue co-design work with conservationists, technical work with interfaces and robotic behaviors, and human-robot field studies in a cycle.
