Ian Walker

Department Head

Professor 

Electrical and Computer Engineering & Computer Science

Room 5068B, Engineering Building

iwalker2@uwyo.edu

(307)766-2282 

University of Wyoming
College of Engineering and Physical Sciences
Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science 
Dept. 3315
1000 E. University Avenue
Laramie, WY 82071

Education

Ph.D., Electrical and Computer Engineering, University of Texas at Austin, 1989

M.S., Electrical and Computer Engineering, University of Texas at Austin, 1985

B.Sc., Mathematics, University of Hull, UK, 1983.

Area of expertise

Robotics: manipulators and manipulation, kinematics, dynamics, and control, continuum "tongue, trunk, and tentacle" robots.

Selected publications

1.  D. Trivedi, C.D. Rahn, W.M. Kier, and I.D. Walker. Soft Robotics: Biological Inspiration, State of the Art, and Future Research. Advanced Bionics and Biomechanics, Vol. 5, No. 2, September 2008, pp. 99-117.
2. K.J. Niklas and I.D. Walker. The Challenges of Inferring Organic Function from and its Emulation in Biomechanics and Biomimetics. Biomimetics, Vol. 6, No. 1, March 2021, pp. 1-12.
3. I.A. Gravagne and I.D. Walker. Manipulability, Force, and Compliance Analysis for Planar Continuum Manipulators. IEEE Transactions on Robotics and Automation, Vol. 18, No. 3, June 2002, pp. 263-273.
4. M.A. Hannan and I.D. Walker. Kinematics and the Implementation of an Elephant's Trunk Manipulator and Other Continuum Style Robots. Journal of Robotic Systems, Vol. 20, No. 2, February 2003, pp. 45-63.
5. B. Jones and I.D. Walker. Kinematics for Multi-Section Continuum Robots. IEEE Transactions on Robotics, Vol. 22, No. 1, February 2006, pp. 45-53.
6. M.B. Wooten, C.G. Frazelle, I.D. Walker, A.D. Kapadia, and J.H. Lee. Exploration and Inspection with Vine-Inspired Continuum Robots. Proceedings IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA), Brisbane, Australia, May 2018, pp. 5526-5523.
7. M.B. Wooten and I.D. Walker. Environmental Interaction with Continuum Robots Exploiting Impact. IEEE Robotics and Automation Letters, Vol. 7, Issue 4, October 2022, pp. 10136-10143.
8. A. Carambia, C.G. Frazelle, A.D. Kapadia, and I.D. Walker, “Non-Cooperative Space Object Capture and Manipulation with Soft Robotics”, Proc. IEEE Aerospace Conference, Big Sky, MT, March 2023, pp. 1-11.
9. M Srivastava and I.D. Walker, “On Tendon Driven Continuum Robots with Compressible Backbones”, Proc. IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA), London, UK, May 2023, pp. 669-675.
10. M. Srivastava, R.E. Groff, and I.D. Walker, “Closed Loop Control of Tendon Driven Continuum Robots using IMUs”, Proc. IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS), Detroit, MI, October 2023, pp. 2558-2563.