Film Streams Omaha, NE
Dr. Brittany Duncan
Ross McCollum Associate Professor of Computing and co-Director of the NIMBUS Lab at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln
Wall-E— Robot rescue: How real-life robots are helping our planet
Program Description
Before the film, Dr. Brittany Duncan will give a short presentation on ecological drones and their impact on environmental monitoring. Through video demonstrations, she will showcase how these cutting-edge technologies are designed to support and protect our planet. Attendees will also have the opportunity to see two innovative robots up close in the theater, including a soil-sampling drone that collects data on environmental conditions and a fireball-dropping drone used for controlled burns—both essential tools in ecological research and land management.
Presented At
Film Streams Omaha, NE
Film Synopsis
In the distant future, a small waste-collecting robot inadvertently embarks on a space journey that will ultimately decide the fate of mankind.
In the distant future, Earth is overrun with garbage and devoid of plant and animal life. The surviving humans live on the spaceship Axiom after vacating the planet hundreds of years earlier. The original plan was for humans to live in outer space for five years while waste-cleaning robots ("WALL-Es") prepared Earth for re-colonization. However, centuries later, just one WALL-E (voiced by Ben Burtt) remains. Lonely, with only a pet cockroach to keep him company, WALL-E discovers a new purpose in life when he meets a sleek search probe named EVE (Elissa Knight). EVE comes to realize that WALL-E has inadvertently stumbled upon the key to the planet's future, and races back to space to report her findings to the humans. Meanwhile, WALL-E chases EVE across the galaxy on a journey that will ultimately decide the fate of mankind. Produced by Pixar and released by Walt Disney Pictures, WALL-E won the Academy Award for Best Animated feature.
Credit: Disney
About the Speaker
Brittany Duncan is the Ross McCollum Associate Professor of Computing and co-Director of the NIMBUS Lab at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. Her research focuses on human-robot interaction, particularly with flying robots, in field domains working with scientists at ecologically sensitive sites. Dr. Duncan is an NSF CAREER awardee and has current NSF funding to understand how flying robots can be used in carbon monitoring in Costa Rica and to study beaver migration in the Arctic. She received her B.S. from Georgia Institute of Technology in 2009 and her Ph.D. from Texas A&M University in 2015.