Francesco Tamburrino francesco@cmu.edu

Francesco Tamburrino was born in Rome, Italy in 1978 -- one year after the appearance of Star Wars' R2-D2 and C-3PO. He matured through high school studying Latin and ancient Greek, which are good for the mind, help stimulate thinking, yada yada yada, but mostly made him see that the world could use some progress now. So he moved to New York to pursue his degree in Electrical Engineering from Columbia University, which he obtained in 2001. He took a year off to improve his knowledge of the French language and of another major European capital, Paris, where he lived for about five months teaching two computer-related courses at the University of Paris VIII - St. Denis. He is now a first-year Master's student in the Robotics Institute, where he hopes to put together the technical, practical, and teamwork skills and knowledge necessary to start giving the world his own share of the liberating progress that a field like robotics can bring about.