The Hierarchic treatment of marine ecological information from spatial networks of benthic platforms

Measuring biodiversity simultaneously in different locations, at different temporal scales, and over wide spatial scales is of strategic importance for the improvement of our understanding of the functioning of marine ecosystems and for the conservation of their biodiversity. Monitoring networks of cabled observatories, along with other docked autonomous systems (e.g., Remotely Operated Vehicles [ROVs], Autonomous Underwater Vehicles [AUVs], and crawlers), are being conceived and established at a spatial scale capable of tracking energy fluxes across benthic and pelagic compartments, as well as across geographic ecotones. At the same time, optoacoustic imaging is sustaining an unprecedented expansion in marine ecological monitoring, enabling the acquisition of new biological and environmental data at an appropriate spatiotemporal scale. At this stage, one of the main problems for an effective application of these technologies is the processing, storage, and treatment of the acquired complex ecological information. Here, we provide a conceptual overview on the technological developments in the multiparametric generation, storage, and automated hierarchic treatment of biological and environmental information required to capture the spatiotemporal complexity of a marine ecosystem. In doing so, we present a pipeline of ecological data acquisition and processing in different steps and prone to automation. We also give an example of population biomass, community richness and biodiversity data computation (as indicators for ecosystem functionality) with an Internet Operated Vehicle (a mobile crawler). Finally, we discuss the software requirements for that automated data processing at the level of cyber-infrastructures with sensor calibration and control, data banking, and ingestion into large data portals.Peer ReviewedPostprint (published version

Social Roles and Baseline Proxemic Preferences for a Domestic Service Robot

© The Author(s) 2014. This article is published with open access at Springerlink.com. This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License which permits any use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author(s) and the source are credited. The work described in this paper was conducted within the EU Integrated Projects LIREC (LIving with Robots and intEractive Companions, funded by the European Commission under contract numbers FP7 215554, and partly funded by the ACCOMPANY project, a part of the European Union’s Seventh Framework Programme (FP7/2007–2013) under grant agreement n287624The goal of our research is to develop socially acceptable behavior for domestic robots in a setting where a user and the robot are sharing the same physical space and interact with each other in close proximity. Specifically, our research focuses on approach distances and directions in the context of a robot handing over an object to a userPeer reviewe

Variational inference for robust sequential learning of multilayered perceptron neural network

U radu je prikazan i izveden novi sekvencijalni algoritam za obučavanje višeslojnog perceptrona u prisustvu autlajera. Autlajeri predstavljaju značajan problem, posebno ukoliko sprovodimo sekvencijalno obučavanje ili obučavanje u realnom vremenu. Linearizovani Kalmanov filtar robustan na autlajere (LKF-RA), je statistički generativni model u kome je matrica kovarijansi šuma merenja modelovana kao stohastički proces, a apriorna informacija usvojena kao inverzna Višartova raspodela. Izvođenje svih jednakosti je bazirano na prvim principima Bajesovske metodologije. Da bi se rešio korak modifikacije primenjen je varijacioni metod, u kome rešenje problema tražimo u familiji raspodela odgovarajuće funkcionalne forme. Eksperimentalni rezultati primene LKF-RA, dobijeni korišćenjem stvarnih vremenskih serija, pokazuju da je LKF-RA bolji od konvencionalnog linearizovanog Kalmanovog filtra u smislu generisanja niže greške na test skupu podataka. Prosečna vrednost poboljšanja određena u eksperimentalnom procesu je 7%.We derive a new sequential learning algorithm for Multilayered Perceptron (MLP) neural network robust to outliers. Presence of outliers in data results in failure of the model especially if data processing is performed on-line or in real time. Extended Kalman filter robust to outliers (EKF-OR) is probabilistic generative model in which measurement noise covariance is modeled as stochastic process over the set of symmetric positive-definite matrices in which prior is given as inverse Wishart distribution. Derivation of expressions comes straight form first principles, within Bayesian framework. Analytical intractability of Bayes' update step is solved using Variational Inference (VI). Experimental results obtained using real world stochastic data show that MLP network trained with proposed algorithm achieves low error and average improvement rate of 7% when compared directly to conventional EKF learning algorithm

Variational inference for robust sequential learning of multilayered perceptron neural network

U radu je prikazan i izveden novi sekvencijalni algoritam za obučavanje višeslojnog perceptrona u prisustvu autlajera. Autlajeri predstavljaju značajan problem, posebno ukoliko sprovodimo sekvencijalno obučavanje ili obučavanje u realnom vremenu. Linearizovani Kalmanov filtar robustan na autlajere (LKF-RA), je statistički generativni model u kome je matrica kovarijansi šuma merenja modelovana kao stohastički proces, a apriorna informacija usvojena kao inverzna Višartova raspodela. Izvođenje svih jednakosti je bazirano na prvim principima Bajesovske metodologije. Da bi se rešio korak modifikacije primenjen je varijacioni metod, u kome rešenje problema tražimo u familiji raspodela odgovarajuće funkcionalne forme. Eksperimentalni rezultati primene LKF-RA, dobijeni korišćenjem stvarnih vremenskih serija, pokazuju da je LKF-RA bolji od konvencionalnog linearizovanog Kalmanovog filtra u smislu generisanja niže greške na test skupu podataka. Prosečna vrednost poboljšanja određena u eksperimentalnom procesu je 7%.We derive a new sequential learning algorithm for Multilayered Perceptron (MLP) neural network robust to outliers. Presence of outliers in data results in failure of the model especially if data processing is performed on-line or in real time. Extended Kalman filter robust to outliers (EKF-OR) is probabilistic generative model in which measurement noise covariance is modeled as stochastic process over the set of symmetric positive-definite matrices in which prior is given as inverse Wishart distribution. Derivation of expressions comes straight form first principles, within Bayesian framework. Analytical intractability of Bayes' update step is solved using Variational Inference (VI). Experimental results obtained using real world stochastic data show that MLP network trained with proposed algorithm achieves low error and average improvement rate of 7% when compared directly to conventional EKF learning algorithm

Grey Wolf Optimization Algorithm for Single Mobile Robot Scheduling

Development of reliable and efficient material transport system is one of the basic requirements for creating an intelligent manufacturing environment. Nowadays, intelligent mobile robots have been widely used as one of the components to satisfy this requirement. In this paper, a methodology based on Grey Wolf Optimization (GWO) algorithm is proposed in order to find the optimal solution of the nondeterministic polynomial-hard (NP-hard) single mobile robot scheduling problem. The performance criterion is to minimize total transportation time of the mobile robot while it performs internal transport of raw materials, goods, and parts in manufacturing system. The scheduling plans are obtained in Matlab environment and tested by Khepera II mobile robot system within a static laboratory model of manufacturing environment. Experimental results show the applicability and effectiveness of the developed intelligent approach in real world conditions

Learning cognitive maps: Finding useful structure in an uncertain world

In this chapter we will describe the central mechanisms that influence how people learn about large-scale space. We will focus particularly on how these mechanisms enable people to effectively cope with both the uncertainty inherent in a constantly changing world and also with the high information content of natural environments. The major lessons are that humans get by with a less is more approach to building structure, and that they are able to quickly adapt to environmental changes thanks to a range of general purpose mechanisms. By looking at abstract principles, instead of concrete implementation details, it is shown that the study of human learning can provide valuable lessons for robotics. Finally, these issues are discussed in the context of an implementation on a mobile robot. © 2007 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg

Cooperative Control for Multiple Autonomous Vehicles Using Descriptor Functions

The paper presents a novel methodology for the control management of a swarm of autonomous vehicles. The vehicles, or agents, may have different skills, and be employed for different missions. The methodology is based on the definition of descriptor functions that model the capabilities of the single agent and each task or mission. The swarm motion is controlled by minimizing a suitable norm of the error between agents’ descriptor functions and other descriptor functions which models the entire mission. The validity of the proposed technique is tested via numerical simulation, using different task assignment scenarios

A NATURALISTIC COMPUTATIONAL MODEL OF HUMAN BEHAVIOR IN NAVIGATION AND SEARCH TASKS

Planning, navigation, and search are fundamental human cognitive abilities central to spatial problem solving in search and rescue, law enforcement, and military operations. Despite a wealth of literature concerning naturalistic spatial problem solving in animals, literature on naturalistic spatial problem solving in humans is comparatively lacking and generally conducted by separate camps among which there is little crosstalk. Addressing this deficiency will allow us to predict spatial decision making in operational environments, and understand the factors leading to those decisions. The present dissertation is comprised of two related efforts, (1) a set of empirical research studies intended to identify characteristics of planning, execution, and memory in naturalistic spatial problem solving tasks, and (2) a computational modeling effort to develop a model of naturalistic spatial problem solving. The results of the behavioral studies indicate that problem space hierarchical representations are linear in shape, and that human solutions are produced according to multiple optimization criteria. The Mixed Criteria Model presented in this dissertation accounts for global and local human performance in a traditional and naturalistic Traveling Salesman Problem. The results of the empirical and modeling efforts hold implications for basic and applied science in domains such as problem solving, operations research, human-computer interaction, and artificial intelligence