Hardware-accelerated image features with subpixel accuracy for SLAM localization and object detection

Die Navigation von autonomen Systemen wird durch den Fortschritt der Technik und durch die steigenden Anforderungen der Anwendungen immer komplexer. Eines der wichtigsten offenen Probleme ist die Genauigkeit und die Robustheit der merkmalsbasierten SLAM-Lokalisierung für Anwendungen im dreidimensionalen Raum. In dieser Arbeit werden Methoden zur Optimierung der Merkmalserkennung mit Subpixel-genauer Bestimmung der Merkmalsposition für merkmalsbasiserte 6-DoF SLAM Verfahren untersucht. Zusätzlich wird eine Erweiterung des Merkmalsdeskriptors mit Farbinformationen und einer Subpixel-genauen Rotation des Deskriptor-Patterns betrachtet. Aus den Ergebnissen der Untersuchung wird das Subpixel-accurate Oriented AGAST and Rotated BRIEF (SOARB) Verfahren zur Merkmalserkennung entwickelt, dass trotz der effizienten und Ressourcen-optimierten Implementierung eine Verbesserung der Lokalisierung und Kartenerstellung in Relation zu anderen vergleichbaren Verfahren erreicht. Durch den Einsatz eines PCIe FPGA-Beschleunigers und der Xilinx SDAccel HW-SW-Codesign Umgebung mit OpenCL Unterstützung wird eine FPGA-basierte Version des SOARB Algorithmus zur Anbindung an SLAM-Systeme gezeigt. Die FPGA-Implementierung des SOARB-Verfahrens erreicht dabei Bildraten von 41 Bildern/s. Sie ist damit um Faktor 2,6x schneller als die schnellste getestete GPU-basierte Implementierung der OpenCV-Bibliothek mit Sub-pixel-genauer Bestimmung der Merkmalsposition. Durch eine geringe Leistungsaufnahme von 13,7W der FPGA-Komponente kann die Leistungseffizienz (Bilder/s pro Watt) des Gesamtsystems im Vergleich zu einer ebenfalls erstellten SOARB GPU-Referenzimplementierung um den Faktor 1,28x gesteigert werden. Der SOARB-Algorithmus wird zur Evaluation in das RTAB-Map SLAM System integriert und erreicht in Tests mit Bildaufnahme-Sequenzen aus dem Straßenverkehr eine Verbesserung des Translations- und Rotationsfehlers von durchschnittlich 22% und 19% im Vergleich zu dem häufig genutzten ORB-Verfahren. Die maximale Verbesserung des Root Mean Square Errors (RMSE) liegt bei 50% für die Translation und 40% für die Rotation. Durch einen Deskriptor mit Farbinformationen kann das SOARB-RGB Verfahren in der Evaluation mit dem Oxford Datensatz zur Bewertung von affinen kovarianten Merkmalen ein sehr gutes Inlier-Verhältnis von 99,2% über die ersten drei Bildvergleiche aller Datensätze erzielen.The navigation of autonomous systems is becoming more and more complex due to advances in technology and the increasing demands of applications. One of the most critical open issues is the accuracy and robustness of feature-based SLAM localization for three-dimensional SLAM applications. In this work the optimization of feature detection with subpixel-accurate features points for feature-based 6-DoF SLAM methods is investigated. In addition, an extension of the feature descriptor with color information and sub-pixel accurate rotation of the descriptor pattern is evaluated. This work develops a Subpixel-accurate Oriented AGAST and Rotated BRIEF (SOARB) feature extraction that, despite the efficient and resource-optimized implementation, improves localization and mapping compared to other comparable algorithms. Using a PCIe FPGA accelerator and the Xilinx SDAccel HW-SW Codesign environment with OpenCL support an FPGA-based version of the SOARB algorithm for interfacing to SLAM systems is demonstrated. The hardware implementation uses high-throughput pipeline processing and parallel units for computation. For faster processing, the subpixel interpolation and a bilinear interpolation is performed in fixed-point arithmetic and the angle calculation is implemented using a CORDIC method. The FPGA implementation of the SOARB algorithm achieves frame rates of 41 frames/s. Thus, it is a factor of 2.6 times faster than the fastest of the tested GPU-based OpenCV implementation with subpixel-accurate feature positions. With a low power consumption of 13.7W of the FPGA component, the overall system power efficiency (fps per watt) can be increased by a factor of 1.28x compared to an implemented SOARB-GPU reference implementation. For evaluation the SOARB algorithm is integrated into the RTAB Map SLAM system. It achieves an average of 22% and 19% improvement in translational and rotational errors compared to the commonly used ORB feature extraction in tests with dataset sequences for autonomous driving. The maximum improvement in root mean square error (RMSE) is 50% for translation and 40% for rotation. To analyze the impact of descriptor with color information, the SOARB-RGB method ist evaluated using the Oxford dataset for affine covariant features. The SOARB-RGB achieves a very good inlier-ratio of 99.2% over the first three dataset image of all datasets

Development of Mining Sector Applications for Emerging Remote Sensing and Deep Learning Technologies

This thesis uses neural networks and deep learning to address practical, real-world problems in the mining sector. The main focus is on developing novel applications in the area of object detection from remotely sensed data. This area has many potential mining applications and is an important part of moving towards data driven strategic decision making across the mining sector. The scientific contributions of this research are twofold; firstly, each of the three case studies demonstrate new applications which couple remote sensing and neural network based technologies for improved data driven decision making. Secondly, the thesis presents a framework to guide implementation of these technologies in the mining sector, providing a guide for researchers and professionals undertaking further studies of this type. The first case study builds a fully connected neural network method to locate supporting rock bolts from 3D laser scan data. This method combines input features from the remote sensing and mobile robotics research communities, generating accuracy scores up to 22% higher than those found using either feature set in isolation. The neural network approach also is compared to the widely used random forest classifier and is shown to outperform this classifier on the test datasets. Additionally, the algorithms’ performance is enhanced by adding a confusion class to the training data and by grouping the output predictions using density based spatial clustering. The method is tested on two datasets, gathered using different laser scanners, in different types of underground mines which have different rock bolting patterns. In both cases the method is found to be highly capable of detecting the rock bolts with recall scores of 0.87-0.96. The second case study investigates modern deep learning for LiDAR data. Here, multiple transfer learning strategies and LiDAR data representations are examined for the task of identifying historic mining remains. A transfer learning approach based on a Lunar crater detection model is used, due to the task similarities between both the underlying data structures and the geometries of the objects to be detected. The relationship between dataset resolution and detection accuracy is also examined, with the results showing that the approach is capable of detecting pits and shafts to a high degree of accuracy with precision and recall scores between 0.80-0.92, provided the input data is of sufficient quality and resolution. Alongside resolution, different LiDAR data representations are explored, showing that the precision-recall balance varies depending on the input LiDAR data representation. The third case study creates a deep convolutional neural network model to detect artisanal scale mining from multispectral satellite data. This model is trained from initialisation without transfer learning and demonstrates that accurate multispectral models can be built from a smaller training dataset when appropriate design and data augmentation strategies are adopted. Alongside the deep learning model, novel mosaicing algorithms are developed both to improve cloud cover penetration and to decrease noise in the final prediction maps. When applied to the study area, the results from this model provide valuable information about the expansion, migration and forest encroachment of artisanal scale mining in southwestern Ghana over the last four years. Finally, this thesis presents an implementation framework for these neural network based object detection models, to generalise the findings from this research to new mining sector deep learning tasks. This framework can be used to identify applications which would benefit from neural network approaches; to build the models; and to apply these algorithms in a real world environment. The case study chapters confirm that the neural network models are capable of interpreting remotely sensed data to a high degree of accuracy on real world mining problems, while the framework guides the development of new models to solve a wide range of related challenges

A Dark Matter Search Using the Final SuperCDMS Soudan Dataset and the Development of a Large-Format, Highly-Multiplexed, Athermal-Phonon-Mediated Particle Detector

Over the past eighty years, numerous complementary observations of our universe have indicated that our current description of physics is far from complete. The "ordinary matter", such as electrons, protons, photons and neutrons, that constitutes the bulk of all human physical experiences is actually only a minority (about 16%) of the total mass of the universe. The remaining 84% is very poorly understood, but has profound effects on the dynamics and evolution of our universe. Because it does not interact with light, and is not observable in telescopes on earth, this extra mass is usually referred to as "dark matter". Although the dark matter is poorly understood, Weakly Interacting Massive Particles (WIMPs) are a well-motivated candidate that can be directly detected via a non-gravitational interaction with normal matter, potentially allowing for direct terrestrial detection and characterization of this dark matter. This dissertation is focused on this direct WIMP detection and will be broken into two main parts. The first part focuses on the blinded analysis of roughly three years of data collected from March 2012 to November 2015 by the SuperCDMS Soudan experiment. SuperCDMS Soudan consists of an array of 15, 0.6-kg, cryogenic, Ge iZIP particle detectors situated in a decommissioned iron mine in remote northern Minnesota. This analysis is optimized to be sensitive to theoretical WIMP masses above 10 GeV/c2. This result set the strongest limits for WIMP--germanium-nucleus interactions for WIMP masses greater than 12 Gev/c2. The second part focuses on the development new kind of particle detector in the style of a SuperCDMS iZIP, designed to simplify fabrication and readout, improve phonon-based position reconstruction, and help to scale to larger target arrays. These detectors replace the TES-based phonon sensors of the iZIP with Microwave Kinetic Inductance Detectors (MKIDs).</p

Recent Advances in Forensic Anthropological Methods and Research

Forensic anthropology, while still relatively in its infancy compared to other forensic science disciplines, adopts a wide array of methods from many disciplines for human skeletal identification in medico-legal and humanitarian contexts. The human skeleton is a dynamic tissue that can withstand the ravages of time given the right environment and may be the only remaining evidence left in a forensic case whether a week or decades old. Improved understanding of the intrinsic and extrinsic factors that modulate skeletal tissues allows researchers and practitioners to improve the accuracy and precision of identification methods ranging from establishing a biological profile such as estimating age-at-death, and population affinity, estimating time-since-death, using isotopes for geolocation of unidentified decedents, radiology for personal identification, histology to assess a live birth, to assessing traumatic injuries and so much more

With dark, rose-coloured glasses: gothic, queer and intertextual labyrinths in the novels by Louise Welsh

Tesis doctoral inédita leída en la Universidad Autónoma de Madrid, Facultad de Filosofía y Letras, Departamento de Lingüística, Lenguas Modernas, Lógica y Fª de la Ciencia y Tª de la Literatura Comparada. Fecha de lectura: 05-05-201

Друга міжнародна конференція зі сталого майбутнього: екологічні, технологічні, соціальні та економічні питання (ICSF 2021). Кривий Ріг, Україна, 19-21 травня 2021 року

Second International Conference on Sustainable Futures: Environmental, Technological, Social and Economic Matters (ICSF 2021). Kryvyi Rih, Ukraine, May 19-21, 2021.Друга міжнародна конференція зі сталого майбутнього: екологічні, технологічні, соціальні та економічні питання (ICSF 2021). Кривий Ріг, Україна, 19-21 травня 2021 року