What was your internship about?
My internship was analyzing data to see how humans judge robotic grasp. Humans are really good at picking things up, but are really bad at describing how they pick things up. [We focused] on stock images of a robotic hand, and how ... humans looked at them when evaluating a grasp, and whether [they thought] it would be successful.
What was especially exciting to you? What really fascinates me- this sounds a bit creepy- is that you can attach a hand to anything. What I liked so much about the survey, and about the area, is that it’s applicable everywhere.
Tell me about being mentored.
I’ll mention what happens at the start of every week. We all got into the big room with giant moving robots with arms attached to them ... Everyone was there- all of the undergraduates, all of the graduate students, all of the professors ... described what we had accomplished, what we wanted to accomplish, how we can go about that and what we needed. The last little bit - what we needed - was really what set this apart from school or any experience I'd had before. It's a place for you to learn and it's a place where you get stuff done.
After his internship ended, Sundberg stayed in his mentors’ lab to continue the project and develop the paper, which he likened to ‘building all the right bricks, then sticking them together.’