Modular Self-Reconfigurable Robot Systems

The field of modular self-reconfigurable robotic systems addresses the design, fabrication, motion planning, and control of autonomous kinematic machines with variable morphology. Modular self-reconfigurable systems have the promise of making significant technological advances to the field of robotics in general. Their promise of high versatility, high value, and high robustness may lead to a radical change in automation. Currently, a number of researchers have been addressing many of the challenges. While some progress has been made, it is clear that many challenges still exist. By illustrating several of the outstanding issues as grand challenges that have been collaboratively written by a large number of researchers in this field, this article has shown several of the key directions for the future of this growing fiel

The control of search and rescue robots with the general suppression control framework

The paper described the use of the general suppression control framework (GSCF) for the control and coordination of a team of search and rescue robots undertaking exploration operation. This study adopts the biological analogy of the human immune system to derive the GSCF having the behavior of immunological cells. The framework directs the coordination of these robots in tackling search and rescue operations in an unstructured environment. Simulation study is performed to demonstrate the effectiveness of the control framework.published_or_final_versio

Streamlined design and self reliant hardware for active control of precision space structures

Precision space structures may require active vibration control to satisfy critical performance requirements relating to line-of-sight pointing accuracy and the maintenance of precise, internal alignments. In order for vibration control concepts to become operational, it is necessary that their benefits be practically demonstrated in large scale ground-based experiments. A unique opportunity to carry out such demonstrations on a wide variety of experimental testbeds was provided by the NASA Control-Structure Integration (CSI) Guest Investigator (GI) Program. This report surveys the experimental results achieved by the Harris Corporation GI team on both Phases 1 and 2 of the program and provides a detailed description of Phase 2 activities. The Phase 1 results illustrated the effectiveness of active vibration control for space structures and demonstrated a systematic methodology for control design, implementation test. In Phase 2, this methodology was significantly streamlined to yield an on-site, single session design/test capability. Moreover, the Phase 2 research on adaptive neural control techniques made significant progress toward fully automated, self-reliant space structure control systems. As a further thrust toward productized, self-contained vibration control systems, the Harris Phase II activity concluded with experimental demonstration of new vibration isolation hardware suitable for a wide range of space-flight and ground-based commercial applications.The CSI GI Program Phase 1 activity was conducted under contract NASA1-18872, and the Phase 2 activity was conducted under NASA1-19372

A review of energy efficient systems integrated into building envelopes

There is an essential need to reduce energy consumption in building sector as it consumes about 40 percent of the world energy and causes environmental problems. About fifty percent of energy in the building sector is used for heating, cooling and air conditioning purposes. Considering building envelopes as particular building elements with many functions which its energetic function is the most important one influencing building energy consumption, enhancing the thermal and energy efficiency of envelopes would decrease energy consumption of the buildings. Building envelopes contain roofs, external walls which are in touch with the outside environment and the floors on the ground. This paper would review a brief history of envelopes evolution and introduce a categorization for the envelopes based on different strategies for enhancing energetic function. A huge literature review on building envelopes has been done to identify different techniques. The result is summarized in five strategies as energy generation, cooling and heating, sun radiation control, and Thermal moderation and adaptive

Federated Embedded Systems – a review of the literature in related fields

This report is concerned with the vision of smart interconnected objects, a vision that has attracted much attention lately. In this paper, embedded, interconnected, open, and heterogeneous control systems are in focus, formally referred to as Federated Embedded Systems. To place FES into a context, a review of some related research directions is presented. This review includes such concepts as systems of systems, cyber-physical systems, ubiquitous computing, internet of things, and multi-agent systems. Interestingly, the reviewed fields seem to overlap with each other in an increasing number of ways