Generalized Coordination of Multi-robot Systems


Book Description

This book provides an accessible overview of the complexities of generalized coordination for students, researchers and practitioners alike. Covering both theory and practical issues, the authors provide examples throughout to clearly illustrate the concepts being discussed.




Integration, Coordination and Control of Multi-Sensor Robot Systems


Book Description

Overview Recent years have seen an increasing interest in the development of multi-sensory robot systems. The reason for this interest stems from a realization that there are fundamental limitations on the reconstruction of environment descriptions using only a single source of sensor information. If robot systems are ever to achieve a degree of intelligence and autonomy, they must be capable of using many different sources of sensory information in an active and dynamic manner. The observations made by the different sensors of a multi-sensor system are always uncertain, usually partial, occasionally spuri9us or incorrect and often geographically or geometrically imcomparable with other sensor views. The sensors of these systems are characterized by the diversity of information that they can provide and by the complexity of their operation. It is the goal of a multi sensor system to combine information from all these different sources into a robust and consistent description of the environment.




Multi-Robot Systems. From Swarms to Intelligent Automata, Volume III


Book Description

This proceedings volume documents recent cutting-edge developments in multi-robot systems research. This volume is the result of the Third International workshop on Multi-Robot Systems that was held in March 2005 at the Naval Research Laboratory in Washington, D.C. This workshop brought together top researchers working in areas relevant to designing teams of autonomous vehicles, including robots and unmanned ground, air, surface, and undersea vehicles. The workshop focused on the challenging issues of team architectures, vehicle learning and adaptation, heterogeneous group control and cooperation, task selection, dynamic autonomy, mixed initiative, and human and robot team interaction. A broad range of applications of this technology are presented in this volume, including UCAVS (Unmanned Combat Air Vehicles), micro-air vehicles, UUVs (Unmanned Underwater Vehicles), UGVs (Unmanned Ground vehicles), planetary exploration, assembly in space, clean-up, and urban search and rescue. This proceedings volume represents the contributions of the top researchers in this field and serves as a valuable tool for professionals in this interdisciplinary field.




Robotic Systems: Concepts, Methodologies, Tools, and Applications


Book Description

Through expanded intelligence, the use of robotics has fundamentally transformed a variety of fields, including manufacturing, aerospace, medicine, social services, and agriculture. Continued research on robotic design is critical to solving various dynamic obstacles individuals, enterprises, and humanity at large face on a daily basis. Robotic Systems: Concepts, Methodologies, Tools, and Applications is a vital reference source that delves into the current issues, methodologies, and trends relating to advanced robotic technology in the modern world. Highlighting a range of topics such as mechatronics, cybernetics, and human-computer interaction, this multi-volume book is ideally designed for robotics engineers, mechanical engineers, robotics technicians, operators, software engineers, designers, programmers, industry professionals, researchers, students, academicians, and computer practitioners seeking current research on developing innovative ideas for intelligent and autonomous robotics systems.




Algorithmic Foundations of Robotics V


Book Description

Selected contributions to the Workshop WAFR 2002, held December 15-17, 2002, Nice, France. This fifth biannual Workshop on Algorithmic Foundations of Robotics focuses on algorithmic issues related to robotics and automation. The design and analysis of robot algorithms raises fundamental questions in computer science, computational geometry, mechanical modeling, operations research, control theory, and associated fields. The highly selective program highlights significant new results such as algorithmic models and complexity bounds. The validation of algorithms, design concepts, or techniques is the common thread running through this focused collection.




Multi-Robot Systems: From Swarms to Intelligent Automata


Book Description

In March 2002, the Naval Research Laboratory brought together leading researchers and government sponsors for a three-day workshop in Washington, D.C. on Multi-Robot Systems. The workshop began with presentations by various government program managers describing application areas and programs with an interest in multi robot systems. Government representatives were on hand from the Office of Naval Research, the Air Force, the Army Research Lab, the National Aeronau tics and Space Administration, and the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency. Top researchers then presented their current activities in the areas of multi robot systems and human-robot interaction. The first two days of the workshop of1ocalizatio~. concentrated on multi-robot control issues, including the topics mapping, and navigation; distributed surveillance; manipulation; coordination and formations; and sensors and hardware. The third day was focused on hu man interactions with multi-robot teams. All presentations were given in a single-track workshop format. This proceedings documents the work presented by these researchers at the workshop. The invited presentations were followed by panel discussions, in which all participants interacted to highlight the challenges of this field and to develop possible solutions. In addition to the invited research talks, students were given an opportunity to present their work at poster sessions.




Autonomous Mobile Robots and Multi-Robot Systems


Book Description

Offers a theoretical and practical guide to the communication and navigation of autonomous mobile robots and multi-robot systems This book covers the methods and algorithms for the navigation, motion planning, and control of mobile robots acting individually and in groups. It addresses methods of positioning in global and local coordinates systems, off-line and on-line path-planning, sensing and sensors fusion, algorithms of obstacle avoidance, swarming techniques and cooperative behavior. The book includes ready-to-use algorithms, numerical examples and simulations, which can be directly implemented in both simple and advanced mobile robots, and is accompanied by a website hosting codes, videos, and PowerPoint slides Autonomous Mobile Robots and Multi-Robot Systems: Motion-Planning, Communication and Swarming consists of four main parts. The first looks at the models and algorithms of navigation and motion planning in global coordinates systems with complete information about the robot’s location and velocity. The second part considers the motion of the robots in the potential field, which is defined by the environmental states of the robot's expectations and knowledge. The robot's motion in the unknown environments and the corresponding tasks of environment mapping using sensed information is covered in the third part. The fourth part deals with the multi-robot systems and swarm dynamics in two and three dimensions. Provides a self-contained, theoretical guide to understanding mobile robot control and navigation Features implementable algorithms, numerical examples, and simulations Includes coverage of models of motion in global and local coordinates systems with and without direct communication between the robots Supplemented by a companion website offering codes, videos, and PowerPoint slides Autonomous Mobile Robots and Multi-Robot Systems: Motion-Planning, Communication and Swarming is an excellent tool for researchers, lecturers, senior undergraduate and graduate students, and engineers dealing with mobile robots and related issues.




Experimental Robotics VII


Book Description

Experimental robotics is at the core of validating robotics research for both its system science and theoretical foundations. Robotics experiments serve as a unifying theme for robotics system science and theoretical foundations. This book collects papers on the state of the art in experimental robotics. The papers were presented at the 2000 International Symposium on Experimental Robotics.




Distributed Control of Robotic Networks


Book Description

This self-contained introduction to the distributed control of robotic networks offers a distinctive blend of computer science and control theory. The book presents a broad set of tools for understanding coordination algorithms, determining their correctness, and assessing their complexity; and it analyzes various cooperative strategies for tasks such as consensus, rendezvous, connectivity maintenance, deployment, and boundary estimation. The unifying theme is a formal model for robotic networks that explicitly incorporates their communication, sensing, control, and processing capabilities--a model that in turn leads to a common formal language to describe and analyze coordination algorithms. Written for first- and second-year graduate students in control and robotics, the book will also be useful to researchers in control theory, robotics, distributed algorithms, and automata theory. The book provides explanations of the basic concepts and main results, as well as numerous examples and exercises. Self-contained exposition of graph-theoretic concepts, distributed algorithms, and complexity measures for processor networks with fixed interconnection topology and for robotic networks with position-dependent interconnection topology Detailed treatment of averaging and consensus algorithms interpreted as linear iterations on synchronous networks Introduction of geometric notions such as partitions, proximity graphs, and multicenter functions Detailed treatment of motion coordination algorithms for deployment, rendezvous, connectivity maintenance, and boundary estimation




Robot Control 1988 (SYROCO'88)


Book Description

Containing 88 papers, the emphasis of this volume is on the control of advanced robots. These robots may be self-contained or part of a system. The applications of such robots vary from manufacturing, assembly and material handling to space work and rescue operations. Topics presented at the Symposium included sensors and robot vision systems as well as the planning and control of robot actions. Main topics covered include the design of control systems and their implementation; advanced sensors and multisensor systems; explicit robot programming; implicit (task-orientated) robot programming; interaction between programming and control systems; simulation as a programming aid; AI techniques for advanced robot systems and autonomous robots.