McLurkin, a research associate at the University of Washington, will present “The End of the World and Other Misconceptions: The Truth about Robotics,” Thursday, Nov. 5, at 7:30 p.m. in the Clark Room of the Wallace Building.

During the presentation, McLurkin will look at society’s views of robots, Hollywood’s portrayal of them, the current state of the art, and the future of technology.

As a child, McLurkin was constantly building with LEGO bricks, cardboard boxes, or any other materials he could get his hands on. Today he continues this tradition, using Mother Nature as a model. His core research is developing distributed algorithms for multi-robot systems: the software for large swarms of autonomous robots. Inspired by the behavior of ants and bees, the SwarmBots perform individual tasks that collectively contribute to the goals of the group. They were originally created during his five-year post as Lead Research Scientist at iRobot, one of the world's leading robotics companies.

In 2003, McLurkin received the Lemelson-MIT Student Prize, which is awarded to burgeoning Massachusetts Institute of Technology student inventors. Also in 2003, he was recognized by Time Magazine as one of five leading robotics engineers in their “Rise of the Machines” feature, and by Black Enterprise magazine as a “Best and Brightest Under 40.” In 2002, he was featured in the Lemelson Center’s nationwide interactive traveling exhibit, Invention at Play, which opened at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History in Washington, D.C.

McLurkin holds a bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering with a minor in mechanical engineering from MIT, a master’s degree in electrical engineering from the University of California, Berkeley, and master’s and doctoral degrees in computer science from MIT.

For more information about the Chautauqua Series, call Bruce MacLaren at 622-1503.