Dr James Law

James holds a joint appointment between the School of Computer Science and the Integrated Manufacturing Group within the Advanced Manufacturing Research Centre (AMRC). His research focuses on trustworthy human-robot collaboration, with particular application to manufacturing settings. He takes a transdisciplinary approach, combining approaches from engineering, social sciences, and the arts to address both technical and social barriers to technology adoption. To achieve this he collaborates closely with colleagues across research disciplines and with a wide variety of stakeholders, employing co-design and co-research techniques as part of a responsible approach to research and innovation. 

James has extensive leadership experience in the UK robotics and innovation landscape, having served as an elected member of the EPSRC UK-RAS network executive committee for nearly a decade, as a director of Sheffield Robotics for eleven years, and as a member of EPSRC Early Career Forums in Manufacturing and the Circular Economy, and Engineering. He is a director and co-founder of Twinality, a University spin-out providing digital twinning tools to enable the design, certification, and management of safer robotic systems.

To engage wider audiences, James has delivered invited talks at venues from TEDx to the European Parliament. He has played a key role in shaping national policy, contributing to UK-RAS White Papers and serving as an expert for Government Office for Science Rapid Tech Reviews and independent robotics landscape and foresight reviews. His public engagement and outreach work includes several years leading the UK-RAS National School Robot Competition, consultant on the BBC Radio 1 Robot Takeover, and a successful campaign for the 2012 Olympic Torch to be carried in celebration of Alan Turing’s centenary (although his first torchbearer nomination - a robot - failed to meet the minimum age requirements).