Robotics Intern - Hardware for Whole-Body Sensing and Manipulation

At Toyota Research Institute (TRI), we’re on a mission to improve the quality of human life. We’re developing new tools and capabilities to amplify the human experience. To lead this transformative shift in mobility, we’ve built a world-class team in Energy & Materials, Human-Centered AI, Human Interactive Driving, and Robotics.

This is a summer 2025 paid 12-week internship opportunity. Please note that this internship will be a hybrid in-office role.

The Mission

Make general-purpose robots a reality.

The Challenge

We envision a future where robots assist with household chores and cooking, aid the elderly in maintaining their independence, and enable people to spend more time on the activities they enjoy most. To achieve this, robots need to be able to operate reliably in messy, unstructured environments. Our mission is to answer the question “What will it take to create truly general-purpose robots that can accomplish a wide variety of tasks in settings like human homes with minimal human supervision?”. We believe that the answer lies in cultivating large-scale datasets of physical interaction from a variety of sources and building on the latest advances in machine learning to learn general purpose robot behaviors from this data.

The Large Behavior Models Division

Our goal is to revolutionize the field of robotic manipulation, enabling long-horizon dexterous behaviors to be efficiently taught, learned, and improved over time in diverse, real world environments. This includes the manipulation of larger and heavy objects that may require a robot to use its whole body.

Our team has deep cross-functional expertise across simulation, perception, controls, hardware, and machine learning, and we measure our success in terms of fundamental capabilities development, as well as research impact via open-source software and publications. Our north star is fundamental technological advancement in building robots which can flexibly perform a wide variety of tasks in diverse environments with minimal human supervision. Come join us and let’s make general-purpose robots a reality!

We operate a fleet of robots, and on-hardware robot-embodied teaching and deployment is a key part of our strategy. Some of our ongoing work is highlighted here.

The Opportunity

We’re looking for a driven research intern with a “make it happen” mentality to develop and deploy new, compliant, whole-body tactile sensing hardware that enables robust and dexterous whole-body manipulation. The ideal candidate is able to operate independently when needed, but works well as part of a larger integrated group at the cutting edge of state-of-the-art robotics and machine learning. 

This role calls for complementary research and engineering expertise in mechanical design, soft robotics, sensing, humanoid systems, quick prototyping, electronics and software development, and machine learning. We’re working on the next generation of Punyo. 

The summer intern will have the opportunity to develop hardware to support and advance our high-level research thrusts in:

- Dexterous whole-body manipulation

- Compliant and durable tactile-sensing hardware

- Robot learning methods for contact-rich skills

- Multimodal tactile sensing and sensor fusion

- Physical human-robot interaction

The intern will have the opportunity to work on a focused project within our core research areas. Your goal will be to create working prototypes, conduct experiments on robot platforms, interact frequently with team members, transfer knowledge and code, and participate in publishing your work. The ideal candidate should be able to distill high-level project goals into an actionable work plan, possess strong knowledge of an above research area, and have demonstrated strong design and rapid prototyping skills.

• Currently pursuing (or recently received) M.S. or Ph.D. in Robotics, Mechanical, Materials, Electronics or Electrical Engineering, or related field.
• Experience in at least one of these topics: Tactile sensing, soft robotics, rapid prototyping, advanced 3D printing, topology/design optimization, contact-rich manipulation, multimodal sensor fusion, physical human-robot interaction.
• Demonstrated expertise in one or more of these areas through publications or through any other evidence of cutting-edge research work.
• Experience working with robot hardware platforms and system integration is highly desirable.

Please add a link to Google Scholar and include a full list of publications when submitting your CV to this position.

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Pursuant to the San Francisco Fair Chance Ordinance, we will consider qualified applicants with arrest and conviction records for employment.