AN IMAGE of a humanoid robot learning about how to play from a young child as part of robotics research at Aberystwyth University has won a top UK science photography award.

‘iCub and the tutor’ by Sandy Spence from the Department of Computer Science is the winner of the ‘People’ prize in this year’s Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council Science Photography Competition.

This is the second year in succession that Spence and colleagues have won the award.

In 2015 ‘The Greatest Discovery’ which showed the iCub humanoid robot ‘listening’ to the unborn child of mother to be Ayesha Jones, won the ‘People’ prize.

A year on, and Ayesha’s daughter Caiya features in ‘iCub and the tutor’, sitting at a table and playing with the iCub robot.

Both images were inspired by the work of the Intelligent Robotics Group at Aberystwyth University who are applying how young children learn about the world around them to the development of humanoid robots.

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