Overview of Battery Monitoring and Recharging of Autonomous Mobile Robot

Mobile robots should be capable of operating with a great degree of autonomy to operate in real social environments. Mobile robotic systems draw power from batteries which have a limited power life. This poses a greater challenge for an autonomous robot. Monitoring the status of the battery power in the robot is therefore important for autonomous robotic systems. Docking and recharging are crucial abilities of autonomous mobile robot to ensure its performance. In this paper, the focus of attention is on the significance of power monitoring for long-term operation of autonomous robots and power estimation and auto-recharging. This paper attempts to brief about a literature review of complete solution for docking methods and recharging the battery of a mobile robot. Major progress is being done on both technology and exploitation of docking mechanism and recharging without any human intervention. This review paper gives the overview of related work in terms of immediate challenges for true energy autonomy in mobile robots with respect to battery technology, power estimation and auto recharging

On the Ethical Quandaries of a Practicing Roboticist: A First-Hand Look

Robotics has progressed substantially over the last 20 years, moving from simple proof-of-concept experimental research to developing market and military technologies that have significant ethical consequences. This paper provides the reflections of a roboticist on current research directions within the field and the social implications associated with its conduct

Self-organizing robot formations using velocity potential fields commands for material transfer

Mobile robot formations differ in accordance with the mission, environment, and robot abilities. In the case of decentralized control, the ability to achieve the shapes of these formations needs to be built in the controllers of each autonomous robot. In this paper, self-organizing formations control for material transfer is investigated, as an alternative to automatic guided vehicles. Leader–follower approach is applied for controllers design to drive the robots toward the goal. The results confirm the ability of velocity potential approach for motion control of both self-organizing formations

Intelligent Simulation Modeling of a Flexible Manufacturing System with Automated Guided Vehicles

Although simulation is a very flexible and cost effective problem solving technique, it has been traditionally limited to building models which are merely descriptive of the system under study. Relatively new approaches combine improvement heuristics and artificial intelligence with simulation to provide prescriptive power in simulation modeling. This study demonstrates the synergy obtained by bringing together the "learning automata theory" and simulation analysis. Intelligent objects are embedded in the simulation model of a Flexible Manufacturing System (FMS), in which Automated Guided Vehicles (AGVs) serve as the material handling system between four unique workcenters. The objective of the study is to find satisfactory AGV routing patterns along available paths to minimize the mean time spent by different kinds of parts in the system. System parameters such as different part routing and processing time requirements, arrivals distribution, number of palettes, available paths between workcenters, number and speed of AGVs can be defined by the user. The network of learning automata acts as the decision maker driving the simulation, and the FMS model acts as the training environment for the automata network; providing realistic, yet cost-effective and risk-free feedback. Object oriented design and implementation of the simulation model with a process oriented world view, graphical animation and visually interactive simulation (using GUI objects such as windows, menus, dialog boxes; mouse sensitive dynamic automaton trace charts and dynamic graphical statistical monitoring) are other issues dealt with in the study

Simulation in Automated Guided Vehicle System Design

The intense global competition that manufacturing companies face today results in an increase of product variety and shorter product life cycles. One response to this threat is agile manufacturing concepts. This requires materials handling systems that are agile and capable of reconfiguration. As competition in the world marketplace becomes increasingly customer-driven, manufacturing environments must be highly reconfigurable and responsive to accommodate product and process changes, with rigid, static automation systems giving way to more flexible types. Automated Guided Vehicle Systems (AGVS) have such capabilities and AGV functionality has been developed to improve flexibility and diminish the traditional disadvantages of AGV-systems. The AGV-system design is however a multi-faceted problem with a large number of design factors of which many are correlating and interdependent. Available methods and techniques exhibit problems in supporting the whole design process. A research review of the work reported on AGVS development in combination with simulation revealed that of 39 papers only four were industrially related. Most work was on the conceptual design phase, but little has been reported on the detailed simulation of AGVS. Semi-autonomous vehicles (SA V) are an innovative concept to overcome the problems of inflexible -systems and to improve materials handling functionality. The SA V concept introduces a higher degree of autonomy in industrial AGV -systems with the man-in-the-Ioop. The introduction of autonomy in industrial applications is approached by explicitly controlling the level of autonomy at different occasions. The SA V s are easy to program and easily reconfigurable regarding navigation systems and material handling equipment. Novel approaches to materials handling like the SA V -concept place new requirements on the AGVS development and the use of simulation as a part of the process. Traditional AGV -system simulation approaches do not fully meet these requirements and the improved functionality of AGVs is not used to its full power. There is a considerflble potential in shortening the AGV -system design-cycle, and thus the manufacturing system design-cycle, and still achieve more accurate solutions well suited for MRS tasks. Recent developments in simulation tools for manufacturing have improved production engineering development and the tools are being adopted more widely in industry. For the development of AGV -systems this has not fully been exploited. Previous research has focused on the conceptual part of the design process and many simulation approaches to AGV -system design lack in validity. In this thesis a methodology is proposed for the structured development of AGV -systems using simulation. Elements of this methodology address the development of novel functionality. The objective of the first research case of this research study was to identify factors for industrial AGV -system simulation. The second research case focuses on simulation in the design of Semi-autonomous vehicles, and the third case evaluates a simulation based design framework. This research study has advanced development by offering a framework for developing testing and evaluating AGV -systems, based on concurrent development using a virtual environment. The ability to exploit unique or novel features of AGVs based on a virtual environment improves the potential of AGV-systems considerably.University of Skovde. European Commission for funding the INCO/COPERNICUS Projec