astronomy

Tessa Lau

Tessa Lau is a astronomy topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand Tessa Lau rather than just read about it. In short: Tessa Lau is a computer scientist, roboticist, and entrepreneur who has drawn on her experience with artificial intelligence, machine learning, and robotics knowledge to solve problems in the hospitality and construction industries. She is the founder and CEO of Dusty Robotics, where she focuses on developing robots that optimize construction work through automation.

Key takeaways

Tessa Lau belongs to astronomy; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect Tessa Lau to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of Tessa Lau from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

Tessa Lau is a computer scientist, roboticist, and entrepreneur who has drawn on her experience with artificial intelligence, machine learning, and robotics knowledge to solve problems in the hospitality and construction industries. She is the founder and CEO of Dusty Robotics, where she focuses on developing robots that optimize construction work through automation. Lau was also the former CTO of Savioke, where she helped develop and deploy robots for the hospitality industry.

Education Lau obtained a BS in computer science from Cornell University in 1995 and graduated with a PhD in machine learning with an emphasis on Human-Computer Interaction from the University of Washington in 2001.

Career Lau spent 11 years at IBM Research working in business process automation and knowledge capture. She then became a research scientist at Willow Garage, where she developed simple user interfaces for personal robots. After Willow Garage shut down in 2013, Lau co-founded Savioke, which developed robots for hotels and apartments. As Chief Technology Officer (CTO), she deployed over 75 delivery robots in the hospitality industry. Lau's drive for faster growth and finding solutions to more pressing problems led her to leave Savioke and establish her own robotics company within a new industry. She first identified problems in the construction industry when she was remodeling her house and noticed the mistakes made by the manual laborers faced with their limited tools. She then began visiting construction sites to learn more about the industry and identify opportunities for artificial intelligence to come into play. As a result of this research, she co-founded Dusty Robotics in 2018 with Philipp Herget, previous robotics hardware lead at Savioke, in Mountain View, California. Lau is the current chief executive officer (CEO) of the company, while Herget is the current CTO. Dusty Robotics has innovated operations in the construction industry with the Field Printer, a digital layout robot. Normally, chalk-line layouts are implemented on construction sites, which leads to large financial and time costs when construction workers attempt to follow the intended blueprint of the architects. As a solution, the robot uses Building Information Modeling (BIM) to print accurate, full-scale, digital plans directly on constructions sites, in turn improving the accuracy of the guiding map. Big contractors like DPR Construction, Turner Construction and Performance Contracting have been using the Field Printer to streamline construction processes. As a testament to its massive success and future potential, Dusty Robotics has raised nearly $70 million from investors as of May 2023. Besides her accomplishments as CEO of Dusty Robotics, Lau serves as Advisor of Cantos Ventures and Venture Partner at NextGen Venture Partners. She was also a member of the CRA-W board, the Computing Research Association (CRA)'s committee focusing on the status of women in computing research.

Awards and recognition In 2015, Lau was recognized as one of the most creative people in business by Fast Company. In 2017, she was named a 2017 Woman of Influence by The Silicon Valley Business Journal. In 2018, she was named by Inc. as one of the Top 5 Innovative Women to Watch in Robotics.

References

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with Tessa Lau

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what Tessa Lau claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In astronomy, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to Tessa Lau before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about Tessa Lau ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of Tessa Lau

In research: Tessa Lau appears in astronomy research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses Tessa Lau in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: Tessa Lau is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics American businesspeople, American businesswomen, American computer scientists, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for Tessa Lau outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study Tessa Lau in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what Tessa Lau means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain Tessa Lau out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is Tessa Lau in simple terms?

Why does Tessa Lau matter?

Because it connects several astronomy ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study Tessa Lau?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on Tessa Lau.