Connectivity-Preserving Swarm Teleoperation With A Tree Network

During swarm teleoperation, the human operator may threaten the distance-dependent inter-robot communications and, with them, the connectivity of the slave swarm. To prevent the harmful component of the human command from disconnecting the swarm network, this paper develops a constructive strategy to dynamically modulate the interconnections of, and the locally injected damping at, all slave robots. By Lyapunov-based set invariance analysis, the explicit law for updating that control gains has been rigorously proven to synchronize the slave swarm while preserving all interaction links in the tree network. By properly limiting the impact of the user command rather than rejecting it entirely, the proposed control law enables the human operator to guide the motion of the slave swarm to the extent to which it does not endanger the connectivity of the swarm network. Experiment results demonstrate that the proposed strategy can maintain the connectivity of the tree network during swarm teleoperation

Passivity-Based Control of Human-Robotic Networks with Inter-Robot Communication Delays and Experimental Verification

In this paper, we present experimental studies on a cooperative control system for human-robotic networks with inter-robot communication delays. We first design a cooperative controller to be implemented on each robot so that their motion are synchronized to a reference motion desired by a human operator, and then point out that each robot motion ensures passivity. Inter-robot communication channels are then designed via so-called scattering transformation which is a technique to passify the delayed channel. The resulting robotic network is then connected with human operator based on passivity theory. In order to demonstrate the present control architecture, we build an experimental testbed consisting of multiple robots and a tablet. In particular, we analyze the effects of the communication delays on the human operator's behavior

분산 제약하에서 원격 제어되는 다수의 논홀로노믹 이동형 로봇 대형 재구성 제어

학위논문 (석사)-- 서울대학교 대학원 : 공과대학 기계항공공학부, 2019. 2. 이동준.본 논문에서는 변화하는 주행 환경에서 분산 제약 하에 다수의 원격으로 제어되는 논홀로노믹 이동형 로봇 대형 재구성 제어에 대한 새로운 프레임워크를 제시하였다. 센싱과 컴퓨팅 능력이 갖추어진 온보드 시스템 로봇들을 활용하여 최근 개발된 예측 디스플레이 기법을 적용, 효율적인 군집 로봇의 원격 제어가 가능하도록 하였다. 잘 알려진 논홀로노믹 패시브 디컴포지션 기법을 기반으로 대형 변경이 가능하도록 새로운 파라미터를 추가, 대형 변경간 발생할 수 있는 문제들에 대해 파악하고 이를 해결하기 위해 포텐셜 필드를 활용하였다. n대의 로봇으로 다양한 대형 변경이 가능토록 시뮬레이션 환경을 조성, 39대의 탱크를 이용하여여 5가지의 각기 다른 대형으로의 변환을 새로이 제시한 알고리즘을 적용하여 구현하였다. 또한 실제 로봇 3대를 활용하여 알고리즘의 효용성에 대한 실험을 필두로 좁은 길목, 개활지 등 연속적으로 변화하는 환경 속에서의 구동을 통해 최종적으로 제시한 프레임워크의 타당성에 대해 검증하였다.We propose a novel framework for formation reconguration of multiple nonholonomic wheeled mobile robots (WMRs) in the changing driving environment. We utilize an onboard system of WMRs with the capability of sensing and computing. Each WMR has the same computing power for visualizing the driving environment, handling the sensing information and calculating the control action. One of the WMRs is the leader with the FPV camera and SLAM, while others with monocular cameras with limited FoV, as the followers, keep a certain desired formation during driving in a distributed manner. We set two control objectives, one is group driving and the other is holding the shape of the formation. We have to capture the control objectives separately and simultaneously, we make the best use of nonholonomic passive decomposition to split the WMRs' kinematics into those of the formation maintaining and group driving. The repulsive potential function to prevent the collision among WMRs and attractive potential function to restrict the boundary of follower WMRs' moving space due to limited FoV range of the monocular cameras while switching their formation are also used. Simulation with 39 tanks and experiments with three WMRs are also performed to verify the proposed framework.Acknowledgements iii List of Figures vii Abbreviations ix 1 Introduction 1 2 Formation Reconguration Control Design 5 2.1 Nonholonomic Passive Decomposition . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5 2.2 Attractive and Repulsive Potential Function . . . . . . . . . . . . 10 2.3 Control Design . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13 2.4 Simulation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14 3 Estimation and Predictive Display 20 3.1 Distributed Pose Estimation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20 3.1.1 EKF Pose Estimation of Leader WMR . . . . . . . . . . . 20 3.1.2 EKF Pose Estimation of Follower WMRs . . . . . . . . . 22 3.2 Predictive Display for Distributed WMRs Teleoperation . . . . . 23 4 Experiment 27 4.1 Test Setup . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27 4.2 Demonstrate the Proposed Algorithm . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30 4.3 Teleoperation Experiment with the Algorithm . . . . . . . . . . . 33 5 Conclusion 40Maste

Modeling and control of UAV bearing formations with bilateral high-level steering

In this paper we address the problem of controlling the motion of a group of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) bound to keep a formation defined in terms of only relative angles (i.e. a bearing formation). This problem can naturally arise within the context of several multi-robot applications such as, e.g. exploration, coverage, and surveillance. First, we introduce and thoroughly analyze the concept and properties of bearing formations, and provide a class of minimally linear sets of bearings sufficient to uniquely define such formations. We then propose a bearing-only formation controller requiring only bearing measurements, converging almost globally, and maintaining bounded inter-agent distances despite the lack of direct metric information.The controller still leaves the possibility of imposing group motions tangent to the current bearing formation. These can be either autonomously chosen by the robots because of any additional task (e.g. exploration), or exploited by an assisting human co-operator. For this latter 'human-in-the-loop' case, we propose a multi-master/multi-slave bilateral shared control system providing the co-operator with some suitable force cues informative of the UAV performance. The proposed theoretical framework is extensively validated by means of simulations and experiments with quadrotor UAVs equipped with onboard cameras. Practical limitations, e.g. limited field-of-view, are also considered. © The Author(s) 2012

Contributions to shared control and coordination of single and multiple robots

L’ensemble des travaux présentés dans cette habilitation traite de l'interface entre un d'un opérateur humain avec un ou plusieurs robots semi-autonomes aussi connu comme le problème du « contrôle partagé ».Le premier chapitre traite de la possibilité de fournir des repères visuels / vestibulaires à un opérateur humain pour la commande à distance de robots mobiles.Le second chapitre aborde le problème, plus classique, de la mise à disposition à l’opérateur d’indices visuels ou de retour haptique pour la commande d’un ou plusieurs robots mobiles (en particulier pour les drones quadri-rotors).Le troisième chapitre se concentre sur certains des défis algorithmiques rencontrés lors de l'élaboration de techniques de coordination multi-robots.Le quatrième chapitre introduit une nouvelle conception mécanique pour un drone quadrirotor sur-actionné avec pour objectif de pouvoir, à terme, avoir 6 degrés de liberté sur une plateforme quadrirotor classique (mais sous-actionné).Enfin, le cinquième chapitre présente une cadre général pour la vision active permettant, en optimisant les mouvements de la caméra, l’optimisation en ligne des performances (en terme de vitesse de convergence et de précision finale) de processus d’estimation « basés vision »

Using haptic feedback in human swarm interaction

A swarm of robots is a large group of individual agents that autonomously coordinate via local control laws. Their emergent behavior allows simple robots to accomplish complex tasks. Since missions may have complex objectives that change dynamically due to environmental and mission changes, human control and influence over the swarm is needed. The field of Human Swarm Interaction (HSI) is young, with few user studies, and even fewer papers focusing on giving non-visual feedback to the operator. The authors will herein present a background of haptics in robotics and swarms and two studies that explore various conditions under which haptic feedback may be useful in HSI. The overall goal of the studies is to explore the effectiveness of haptic feedback in the presence of other visual stimuli about the swarm system. The findings show that giving feedback about nearby obstacles using a haptic device can improve performance, and that a combination of feedback from obstacle forces via the visual and haptic channels provide the best performance

Human Swarm Interaction: An Experimental Study of Two Types of Interaction with Foraging Swarms

In this paper we present the first study of human-swarm interaction comparing two fundamental types of interaction, coined intermittent and environmental. These types are exemplified by two control methods, selection and beacon control, made available to a human operator to control a foraging swarm of robots. Selection and beacon control differ with respect to their temporal and spatial influence on the swarm and enable an operator to generate different strategies from the basic behaviors of the swarm. Selection control requires an active selection of groups of robots while beacon control exerts an influence on nearby robots within a set range. Both control methods are implemented in a testbed in which operators solve an information foraging problem by utilizing a set of swarm behaviors. The robotic swarm has only local communication and sensing capabilities. The number of robots in the swarm range from 50 to 200. Operator performance for each control method is compared in a series of missions in different environments with no obstacles up to cluttered and structured obstacles. In addition, performance is compared to simple and advanced autonomous swarms. Thirty-two participants were recruited for participation in the study. Autonomous swarm algorithms were tested in repeated simulations. Our results showed that selection control scales better to larger swarms and generally outperforms beacon control. Operators utilized different swarm behaviors with different frequency across control methods, suggesting an adaptation to different strategies induced by choice of control method. Simple autonomous swarms outperformed human operators in open environments, but operators adapted better to complex environments with obstacles. Human controlled swarms fell short of task-specific benchmarks under all conditions. Our results reinforce the importance of understanding and choosing appropriate types of human-swarm interaction when designing swarm systems, in addition to choosing appropriate swarm behaviors

Teleoperation of passivity-based model reference robust control over the internet

This dissertation offers a survey of a known theoretical approach and novel experimental results in establishing a live communication medium through the internet to host a virtual communication environment for use in Passivity-Based Model Reference Robust Control systems with delays. The controller which is used as a carrier to support a robust communication between input-to-state stability is designed as a control strategy that passively compensates for position errors that arise during contact tasks and strives to achieve delay-independent stability for controlling of aircrafts or other mobile objects. Furthermore the controller is used for nonlinear systems, coordination of multiple agents, bilateral teleoperation, and collision avoidance thus maintaining a communication link with an upper bound of constant delay is crucial for robustness and stability of the overall system. For utilizing such framework an elucidation can be formulated by preparing site survey for analyzing not only the geographical distances separating the nodes in which the teleoperation will occur but also the communication parameters that define the virtual topography that the data will travel through. This survey will first define the feasibility of the overall operation since the teleoperation will be used to sustain a delay based controller over the internet thus obtaining a hypothetical upper bound for the delay via site survey is crucial not only for the communication system but also the delay is required for the design of the passivity-based model reference robust control. Following delay calculation and measurement via site survey, bandwidth tests for unidirectional and bidirectional communication is inspected to ensure that the speed is viable to maintain a real-time connection. Furthermore from obtaining the results it becomes crucial to measure the consistency of the delay throughout a sampled period to guarantee that the upper bound is not breached at any point within the communication to jeopardize the robustness of the controller. Following delay analysis a geographical and topological overview of the communication is also briefly examined via a trace-route to understand the underlying nodes and their contribution to the delay and round-trip consistency. To accommodate the communication channel for the controller the input and output data from both nodes need to be encapsulated within a transmission control protocol via a multithreaded design of a robust program within the C language. The program will construct a multithreaded client-server relationship in which the control data is transmitted. For added stability and higher level of security the channel is then encapsulated via an internet protocol security by utilizing a protocol suite for protecting the communication by authentication and encrypting each packet of the session using negotiation of cryptographic keys during each session