Professor Nadia Magnenat-Thalmann

With an extensive academic foundation in Psychology, Biology, Chemistry, and Quantum Physics, the speaker embarked on a journey to explore and shape the intersection of human behavior and technology. The journey began with pioneering work in the field of virtual humans and digital twins, using cutting-edge pioneer techniques to model and recreate iconic figures like Marilyn Monroe and Humphrey Bogart. The speaker will introduce her groundbreaking work in creating digital twins of legendary figures, bringing them to life.

The next decade, the nineties, was for defining the cloning of hundreds of virtual humans, while simulating their emotions, and particularly a pioneering work on the physical simulation of clothes.  Special emphasis was given on how these Virtual Humans are interacting with their environments in VR or in Cultural Heritage or in medical field.

Since 2008, our first realistic robotic human head named Eva was created, designed to engage with humans in various capacities. in 2013, Nadine was cloned according to the speaker and started by answering questions and retaining conversational memories, evolving to physical tasks such as grasping objects and assisting with daily needs. She has been deployed as caretaker and receptionist, especially in settings like elderly homes. This demonstrates the growing role of robots in enhancing the quality of life, particularly for vulnerable populations.

Recent examples will be shown of Nadine as an AI adviser in various United Nations departments, marking a significant leap in the integration of AI-driven assistants in diplomacy and international cooperation. We will finish our presentation by discussing the importance of having Personal AI Coaches: We are working towards the vision that social robots and AI-driven assistants seamlessly integrate into our daily lives, augmenting human abilities, enhancing personal well-being, and serving as invaluable companions in the modern world.

My Journey to Nadine: From Studying Life to Creating Virtual Humans and Social Robots

Short Bio: Professor Nadia Magnenat Thalmann began her career in Canada at Université Laval and later at the Université de Montréal, pioneering 3D human simulation. Her multi-awarded-winning film, Rendez-vous in Montreal, was the first to feature virtual recreations of legendary Hollywood icons. In 1989, she founded MIRALab at the University of Geneva, a pioneering research lab exploring 3D fashion, interactive Virtual Humans, and augmented reality. Her innovations include a 3D see-through virtual patient model, which won a Eurographics award, and LifePlus, a EU project recreating daily life in ancient Pompeii that has been highly cited. From 2009 to 2022, she was Director of the BeingThere Centre and the Institute for Media Innovation (IMI) at Nanyang Technological University (NTU), Singapore. There, she led groundbreaking research in social robotics, unveiling Nadine, a humanoid robot capable of displaying emotions, recognizing people, and remembering past interactions—one of the most advanced social robots ever created. Professor Thalmann’s academic background is remarkably diverse. She holds multiple degrees in psychology, biology, chemistry, and computer science, along with a Ph.D. in quantum physics from the University of Geneva. Her achievements have earned her numerous honorary doctorates, including from Leibniz University Hannover and the University of Ottawa. She has also received prestigious awards, such as the Humboldt Research Award and the Eurographics Career Award. She currently serves as Editor-in-Chief of The Visual Computer (Springer) and Co-Editor-in-Chief of Computer Animation and Virtual Worlds (Wiley) and is a lifetime member of the Swiss Academy of Engineering Sciences. Her pioneering contributions continue to shape the future of AI, robotics, and virtual reality.

Abstract

In this talk, we will show how we worked very early on the concept of abstract machines for portable compilers and operating systems, as a forerunner of Java. These concepts imported in Computer Graphics have led to the design and implementation of abstract graphical types used for producing the first 3D computer movie telling a story “Dream Flight”, which received many awards and was shown in SIGGRAPH 83. This was the starting point of our Virtual Humans who could have their own behavior like walking and grasping objects. We extended these concepts to objects we defined as smart objects, which are objects that describe their own possible interactions by users as well as by virtual humans. As Virtual Humans were populated Virtual Worlds and could become a large population, rendering of tens of thousands of agents, collision detection and generation of varieties of individual people became important issues. We launched the first project on human crowd animation initiating a new field of animation that now attracts many researchers. We will discuss how Interacting with Virtual Humans in the Virtual Worlds became essential to Virtual Reality as well as walking in the Virtual World and grasping objects with force feedback.