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Welcome

We are very pleased to welcome you to the 17th RoboCup International Competition Symposium!

The RoboCup competition is a great way to benchmark advances in robotics on an equal playing field. Yet, the games are even more interesting when you know the research and technology behind the scenes.

The RoboCup International Symposium gives the opportunity to exchange and discuss the cutting edge ideas and results behind the RoboCup. For the 17th RoboCup International Symposium, we received 97 submissions. The submissions were reviewed carefully by the International Program Committee, which consisted of 60 members. Each paper was reviewed by three reviewers. Overall, we accepted 33 regular papers and 19 special track papers. The decision on the best paper award is being made by an Award Selection Committee, based on the results of the review process, and based on the presentation of the nominated papers at the symposium. We would like to thank everybody that made this symposium possible.

We would especially thank the foundation Autonome Intelligente Robots, that promotes the RoboCup in the Netherlands since the European Championships in 2000, who sponsored the production of this proceedings. Also special thanks to Robin Soetens, who made the design on the cover of the stick.

Manuela M. Veloso
Sven Behnke
Arnoud Visser
Rong Xiong
The 2013 Symposium Co-Chairs