Papers
19
Total Citations
396
H-Index
12
About
David Lees is a pioneering roboticist whose career bridges assistive technology, human-robot interaction, and space exploration. His most impactful work, a 1989 clinical evaluation of a desktop robotic assistant (101 citations), demonstrated how voice-controlled robotic workstations could restore daily living and vocational capabilities for individuals with high-level quadriplegia, fundamentally shaping the field of rehabilitation robotics. Lees has since made seminal contributions to human-robot teaming for space missions, developing peer-to-peer interaction frameworks (36 citations) and autonomous instrument placement systems (26 citations) that directly informed NASA's Mars Science Laboratory operations. His leadership of the Pavilion Lake Research Project (40 citations) established critical analog science methodologies for preparing astronauts for lunar and Martian exploration. Lees also advanced robot programming through visual languages like RoboGlyph (24 citations), making robot command accessible in unstructured environments. His work on binary manipulators (16 citations) opened new possibilities for service robotics. With over 300 total citations spanning rehabilitation, planetary exploration, and human-robot collaboration, Lees stands as a visionary who has consistently translated complex robotic capabilities into practical systems that extend human reach—whether for a quadriplegic individual or an astronaut on the Moon.
Research Focus
Key Achievements
Top Papers
- 1Clinical evaluation of a desktop robotic assistant.101 citations · 1989
- 2
- 3A Preliminary Study of Peer-to-Peer Human-Robot Interaction36 citations · 2006
- 4Mission planning and target tracking for autonomous instrument placement26 citations · 2005
- 5Field Testing of Utility Robots for Lunar Surface Operations24 citations · 2008
- 6
- 7
- 8
- 9
- 10A comparison of rehabilitation robotics languages and software14 citations · 1997