Prof Abderrahmane Kheddar

Professor Abderrahmane Kheddar received the B.S. degree in computer science from the Institut National d’Informatique (now ESI), Algiers, in 1990, and the M.Sc. and Ph.D. degrees in robotics from Sorbonne University, Paris, in 1993 and 1997, respectively. In 2008, he created the CNRS–AIST Joint Robotics Laboratory, an international research laboratory located in Tsukuba, Japan, where he served as Director from 2008 to 2016 and as Co-Director from 2017 to 2021. In 2010, he also founded the Interactive Digital Humans team at the Laboratory of Computer Science, Robotics and Microelectronics of Montpellier (LIRMM), CNRS, University of Montpellier, which he led until 2020. Since 2020, he has been leading the Bionics Platform and the Bionics Initiative at CARTIGEN, University Hospital of Montpellier. His research interests include humanoids, haptics, and bionics. With his team, he was the first to demonstrate the use of humanoids in large-scale manufacturing through a joint project with Airbus, followed by major projects with other industries, including Michelin, Kawasaki, and Honda R&D. He is an IEEE Fellow, a Fellow of the Asia-Pacific Artificial Intelligence Association, a Fellow of the Asian Control Association, and Vice-President of the International Artificial Intelligence Industry Alliance (AIIA). He is a Full Member of the National Academy of Technologies of France and a Knight of the French National Order of Merit.