Holly Yanco is a Professor of Computer Science at the University of Massachusetts Lowell, where she founded and directs the Robotics Laboratory. She is also the Director of the New England Robotics Validation and Experimentation (NERVE) Center. Her research addresses the design and evaluation of human-robot interaction, from autonomy levels to interaction design, in application domains ranging from assistive technology to search and rescue.
Yanco’s research has been funded by the National Science Foundation, including a Career Award, the Army Research Office, DARPA, and the National Institute of Standards and Technology. She is a Senior Member of the Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence (AAAI). Yanco is currently co-chair of the Steering Committee of the ACM/IEEE Human-Robot Interaction Conference and Journal and served on the Executive Council of AAAI from 2006-2009. Yanco has a PhD and MS in Computer Science from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and a BA in Computer Science and Philosophy from Wellesley College.
