Mary “Missy” Cummings is an associate professor in the Department of Mechanical Engineering and Materials Science at Duke University’s Pratt School of Engineering. A former fighter pilot for the U.S. Navy, Dr. Cummings focuses her research on interactions between human and computer decision-making and is a sought-after expert on drones.
Her Humans and Autonomy Lab (HAL) at Duke goes beyond the study of drones, however; Cummings works with a variety of autonomous systems including driverless cars and mining operations. She also looks at some of the consequences of increased automation, such as supervisor boredom.
“People are just bored out of their minds supervising these nearly autonomous systems,” said Cummings. “So not only do we have to deal with that, we have to figure out how to keep the human in the loop – someone who is not an expert in robotics – enough to understand how to solve problems,” says Cummings.