Invention of Control Barrier Functions (CBFs)
Created out of necessity with automotive leaders
After demonstrating a powerful new control method to two automotive giants that could guarantee stability of their adaptive cruise control and lanekeeping, Prof. Aaron Ames asked about the process of getting these controllers on their production vehicles. The automotive executives laughed, saying that the controllers on their cars were tuned by experts and proven reliable over decades, and that they won't be replaced. They did say, however, that if the same guarantees could be made by a module that sits on top of their existing controllers, it would have a chance of making it into production. With this inspiration, Control Barrier Functions (CBFs) were born.
Founders begin collaborating
In 2015, the founders met at Georgia Tech, where they began their work bringing CBFs to life in real-world applications. The goal was to take the theoretical guarantees and turn them into practical safety assurances for a variety of robotic systems.
First hardware results
In 2017, the team achieved their first major milestone towards their goal: a hardware implementation of CBFs on a Segway platform. The results can be read about here.
First dissertation on CBFs
In February of 2020, co-founder Thomas Gurriet gave the first PhD dissertation on CBFs. This dissertation highlighted the many hardware results and industry collaborations that emerged since 2017.
Founding of 3Laws Robotics
In May of 2022, as Andrew SIngletary was finalizing the second PhD thesis on CBFs, the team founded 3Laws Robotics Inc.
