The Eighth International Symposium of Robotics Research was held in Shonan near Kamakura, Japan from October 4 to 7, 1997, organized by the International Foundation of Robotics Research (IFRR). The goal of the Symposium was to bring together active, leading robotics researchers from academia and industry to assess the state of art of Advanced Robotics and to discuss future research directions. The Symposium was held in an informal setting with fifty nine participants. Attendance was limited in order to maximize interaction. The selection of participants was made by the Program Committee using a process of nomination and voting. The Program Committee consisted of the seventeen officers of the IFRR: (University of Pennsylvania, USA) Ruzena Bajcy (Oxford University, UK) Andrew Blake (SRI International, USA) Robert Bolles (Scuola Superiore Sant' Anna, Pis a, Italy) Paolo Dario (Katholieke Universiteit, Leuven, Belgium) Joris De Schutter (LAAS-CNRS, France), Secretary Georges Giralt (DLR, Germany) Gerd Hirzinger (Tokyo Institute of Technology, Japan) Shigeo Hirose (University of Tokyo, Japan), President Hirochika Inoue (Monash University, Australia) Ray Jarvis (CMU, USA), Treasurer Takeo Kanade (University of Michigan, USA) Dan Koditschek (University of Tokyo, Japan) Hirofumi Miura (University of Pennsylvania, USA) Richard Paul (Stanford University, USA) Bernie Roth Y oshiaki Shirai (Osaka University, Japan) Tsuneo Yoshikawa (Kyoto University, Japan) While a limited number of participants were nominated in each area by the Program Committee members of the area, a call for papers was issued in order to include researchers who had made
