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Glossary

This section provides definitions for key terms used throughout the "Physical AI & Humanoid Robotics" textbook.

A​

Agent: An autonomous entity that perceives its environment and acts upon that environment to achieve goals.

AI (Artificial Intelligence): The simulation of human intelligence processes by machines, especially computer systems.

B​

Biomechanics: The study of the mechanical laws relating to the movement or structure of living organisms.

C​

Cognitive Science: The interdisciplinary study of mind and intelligence, embracing philosophy, psychology, artificial intelligence, neuroscience, linguistics, and anthropology.

D​

Digital Twin: A virtual representation of a physical object or system, updated from real-time data, and used for simulation, integration, and testing.

Docusaurus: A static-site generator that helps you build documentation websites.

E​

Embodied Intelligence: A concept in AI and robotics suggesting that intelligence emerges from the interaction of a body with its environment, rather than solely from abstract computation.

Ethics: The moral principles that govern a person's or group's behavior. In AI, this refers to the responsible development and deployment of intelligent systems.

G​

Gazebo: An open-source 3D robotics simulator widely used in research and development. It provides the ability to accurately and efficiently simulate populations of robots in complex indoor and outdoor environments.

H​

Human-Robot Interaction (HRI): The study of interactions between humans and robots, aiming to understand, design, and evaluate robotic systems for human use.

I​

Isaac Sim (NVIDIA Isaac Sim): A scalable robotics simulation platform and synthetic data generation tool that powers the development, testing, and management of AI-based robots.

R​

ROS 2 (Robot Operating System 2): A flexible framework for writing robot software, providing a collection of tools, libraries, and conventions that aim to simplify the task of creating complex and robust robot behavior.

U​

URDF (Unified Robot Description Format): An XML file format for describing robots in ROS, used to represent a robot model's kinematic and dynamic properties.

V​

VLA (Vision-Language-Action): Refers to AI models or systems that integrate capabilities for visual perception, natural language understanding, and physical action or decision-making.