In the last fifteen years, robotics has continued its earlier trend of intensive development worldwide. Besides industry, robots and manipulators have found applications in an increasing number of fields, such as: medicine and human care, extreme external environments (radioactive zones, seas, oceans, space) and many other places. The first personal robots have also emerged, as well as robots for sports games and entertainment.United Europe is also keeping pace with the global development in this field (see for example: < www.robotics-platform.eu.com > - ICT European Technology Platforms - European Robotics Platform – EUROP).Fewer and fewer people want to perform health-dangerous activities or engage in heavy physical labor. Therefore, the following unpleasant trend is observed: the cost of labor is continuously increasing, approximately doubling every 10 years. The requirements for product quality are expanding the need for introducing flexible automation, which is directly related to the application of robots.In the Republic of Bulgaria, both before and after achieving full membership in the European Union, traditions related to the development of robotics have been maintained.Interdisciplinary training in Robotics in Bulgaria, there have long been established traditions, and it has long become an integral part of modern automation, computer science, and mechatronics. For example, training for engineers in the field of robotics has been conducted since 1980, mainly at TUT-Sofia, which is fully consistent with the ideas of prioritizing the development of high-tech parks in the Republic of Bulgaria. In this regard, the leading department in robotics education is now the Department ofAutomation of Electric Drives” (AEZ) to the Faculty of Automation at TU-Sofia, which includes the successor of the Department of "Robotics". The motivation of the Department of AEZ to conduct doctoral studies in the scientific specialty "Robots and Manipulators", is also determined by some historical circumstances, taking into account the development and establishment of robotics in Bulgaria in the late 1970s and early 1980s of the last century.The scientific specialty "Robots and Manipulators", remains the only scientific specialty that directly corresponds to the training for the degree of "Doctor" in the field of robotics and robotic systems. The Department AEZ of FA, supported by some other departments, also from FA, for more than fifteen years has been successfully conducting training for doctoral students in the scientific specialty "Systems with Artificial Intelligence", which further develops some modern aspects of contemporary robotics, as these two scientific fields are, to some extent, conceptually and methodologically interconnected, and moreover, it is often necessary for them to mutually penetrate and enrich each other.The Department of AEZ is an important educational unit in the system of our higher education, which, despite difficulties, continues to offer training in Robotics at the Bachelor's (OQS "bachelor"), Master's (OQS "master"), and Doctoral (ONS "doctor") levels. In this regard, the Department of AEZ continues to make its important contribution to the development of the scientific field of "robotics and highly automated and robotic industrial technologies and production systems". It has earned a relatively good national and, to some extent, international recognition, and possesses the necessary prerequisites such as: experience, tradition, qualified scientific potential, material laboratory base, etc., suitable for the training of doctoral students in the interdisciplinary field of contemporary robotics.As noted above, education and research activities in this modern field have long-standing traditions. The achievements are mainly expressed in the successful placement of graduates with all three levels of higher education - Bachelor's (OQS "bachelor"), Master's (OQS "master"), and Doctoral (ONS "doctor") degrees, both in the country and abroad. These specialists are in demand as personnel in the field of higher education, research institutes of the Bulgarian Academy of Sciences (Institute of Systems Engineering and Robotics, Institute of Mechanics, Institute of Information and Communication Technologies and others), as well as in industry and private business. Scientific developments in the field of automation and robotics, have been recognized and accepted by a large number of specialists in Bulgaria and other countries and have been protected with prestigious scientific publications and patents.
