2,082 research outputs found
Unsupervised Contact Learning for Humanoid Estimation and Control
This work presents a method for contact state estimation using fuzzy
clustering to learn contact probability for full, six-dimensional humanoid
contacts. The data required for training is solely from proprioceptive sensors
- endeffector contact wrench sensors and inertial measurement units (IMUs) -
and the method is completely unsupervised. The resulting cluster means are used
to efficiently compute the probability of contact in each of the six
endeffector degrees of freedom (DoFs) independently. This clustering-based
contact probability estimator is validated in a kinematics-based base state
estimator in a simulation environment with realistic added sensor noise for
locomotion over rough, low-friction terrain on which the robot is subject to
foot slip and rotation. The proposed base state estimator which utilizes these
six DoF contact probability estimates is shown to perform considerably better
than that which determines kinematic contact constraints purely based on
measured normal force.Comment: Submitted to the IEEE International Conference on Robotics and
Automation (ICRA) 201
Unsupervised Contact Learning for Humanoid Estimation and Control
This work presents a method for contact state estimation using fuzzy
clustering to learn contact probability for full, six-dimensional humanoid
contacts. The data required for training is solely from proprioceptive sensors
- endeffector contact wrench sensors and inertial measurement units (IMUs) -
and the method is completely unsupervised. The resulting cluster means are used
to efficiently compute the probability of contact in each of the six
endeffector degrees of freedom (DoFs) independently. This clustering-based
contact probability estimator is validated in a kinematics-based base state
estimator in a simulation environment with realistic added sensor noise for
locomotion over rough, low-friction terrain on which the robot is subject to
foot slip and rotation. The proposed base state estimator which utilizes these
six DoF contact probability estimates is shown to perform considerably better
than that which determines kinematic contact constraints purely based on
measured normal force.Comment: Submitted to the IEEE International Conference on Robotics and
Automation (ICRA) 201
Cooperative localization for mobile agents: a recursive decentralized algorithm based on Kalman filter decoupling
We consider cooperative localization technique for mobile agents with
communication and computation capabilities. We start by provide and overview of
different decentralization strategies in the literature, with special focus on
how these algorithms maintain an account of intrinsic correlations between
state estimate of team members. Then, we present a novel decentralized
cooperative localization algorithm that is a decentralized implementation of a
centralized Extended Kalman Filter for cooperative localization. In this
algorithm, instead of propagating cross-covariance terms, each agent propagates
new intermediate local variables that can be used in an update stage to create
the required propagated cross-covariance terms. Whenever there is a relative
measurement in the network, the algorithm declares the agent making this
measurement as the interim master. By acquiring information from the interim
landmark, the agent the relative measurement is taken from, the interim master
can calculate and broadcast a set of intermediate variables which each robot
can then use to update its estimates to match that of a centralized Extended
Kalman Filter for cooperative localization. Once an update is done, no further
communication is needed until the next relative measurement
Indoor Geo-location And Tracking Of Mobile Autonomous Robot
The field of robotics has always been one of fascination right from the day of Terminator. Even though we still do not have robots that can actually replicate human action and intelligence, progress is being made in the right direction. Robotic applications range from defense to civilian, in public safety and fire fighting. With the increase in urban-warfare robot tracking inside buildings and in cities form a very important application. The numerous applications range from munitions tracking to replacing soldiers for reconnaissance information. Fire fighters use robots for survey of the affected area. Tracking robots has been limited to the local area under consideration. Decision making is inhibited due to limited local knowledge and approximations have to be made. An effective decision making would involve tracking the robot in earth co-ordinates such as latitude and longitude. GPS signal provides us sufficient and reliable data for such decision making. The main drawback of using GPS is that it is unavailable indoors and also there is signal attenuation outdoors. Indoor geolocation forms the basis of tracking robots inside buildings and other places where GPS signals are unavailable. Indoor geolocation has traditionally been the field of wireless networks using techniques such as low frequency RF signals and ultra-wideband antennas. In this thesis we propose a novel method for achieving geolocation and enable tracking. Geolocation and tracking are achieved by a combination of Gyroscope and encoders together referred to as the Inertial Navigation System (INS). Gyroscopes have been widely used in aerospace applications for stabilizing aircrafts. In our case we use gyroscope as means of determining the heading of the robot. Further, commands can be sent to the robot when it is off balance or off-track. Sensors are inherently error prone; hence the process of geolocation is complicated and limited by the imperfect mathematical modeling of input noise. We make use of Kalman Filter for processing erroneous sensor data, as it provides us a robust and stable algorithm. The error characteristics of the sensors are input to the Kalman Filter and filtered data is obtained. We have performed a large set of experiments, both indoors and outdoors to test the reliability of the system. In outdoors we have used the GPS signal to aid the INS measurements. When indoors we utilize the last known position and extrapolate to obtain the GPS co-ordinates
Beyond Basins of Attraction: Quantifying Robustness of Natural Dynamics
Properly designing a system to exhibit favorable natural dynamics can greatly
simplify designing or learning the control policy. However, it is still unclear
what constitutes favorable natural dynamics and how to quantify its effect.
Most studies of simple walking and running models have focused on the basins of
attraction of passive limit-cycles and the notion of self-stability. We instead
emphasize the importance of stepping beyond basins of attraction. We show an
approach based on viability theory to quantify robust sets in state-action
space. These sets are valid for the family of all robust control policies,
which allows us to quantify the robustness inherent to the natural dynamics
before designing the control policy or specifying a control objective. We
illustrate our formulation using spring-mass models, simple low dimensional
models of running systems. We then show an example application by optimizing
robustness of a simulated planar monoped, using a gradient-free optimization
scheme. Both case studies result in a nonlinear effective stiffness providing
more robustness.Comment: 15 pages. This work has been accepted to IEEE Transactions on
Robotics (2019
Past, Present, and Future of Simultaneous Localization And Mapping: Towards the Robust-Perception Age
Simultaneous Localization and Mapping (SLAM)consists in the concurrent
construction of a model of the environment (the map), and the estimation of the
state of the robot moving within it. The SLAM community has made astonishing
progress over the last 30 years, enabling large-scale real-world applications,
and witnessing a steady transition of this technology to industry. We survey
the current state of SLAM. We start by presenting what is now the de-facto
standard formulation for SLAM. We then review related work, covering a broad
set of topics including robustness and scalability in long-term mapping, metric
and semantic representations for mapping, theoretical performance guarantees,
active SLAM and exploration, and other new frontiers. This paper simultaneously
serves as a position paper and tutorial to those who are users of SLAM. By
looking at the published research with a critical eye, we delineate open
challenges and new research issues, that still deserve careful scientific
investigation. The paper also contains the authors' take on two questions that
often animate discussions during robotics conferences: Do robots need SLAM? and
Is SLAM solved
Proprioceptive Invariant Robot State Estimation
This paper reports on developing a real-time invariant proprioceptive robot
state estimation framework called DRIFT. A didactic introduction to invariant
Kalman filtering is provided to make this cutting-edge symmetry-preserving
approach accessible to a broader range of robotics applications. Furthermore,
this work dives into the development of a proprioceptive state estimation
framework for dead reckoning that only consumes data from an onboard inertial
measurement unit and kinematics of the robot, with two optional modules, a
contact estimator and a gyro filter for low-cost robots, enabling a significant
capability on a variety of robotics platforms to track the robot's state over
long trajectories in the absence of perceptual data. Extensive real-world
experiments using a legged robot, an indoor wheeled robot, a field robot, and a
full-size vehicle, as well as simulation results with a marine robot, are
provided to understand the limits of DRIFT
Invariant EKF Design for Scan Matching-aided Localization
Localization in indoor environments is a technique which estimates the
robot's pose by fusing data from onboard motion sensors with readings of the
environment, in our case obtained by scan matching point clouds captured by a
low-cost Kinect depth camera. We develop both an Invariant Extended Kalman
Filter (IEKF)-based and a Multiplicative Extended Kalman Filter (MEKF)-based
solution to this problem. The two designs are successfully validated in
experiments and demonstrate the advantage of the IEKF design
SOTER: A Runtime Assurance Framework for Programming Safe Robotics Systems
The recent drive towards achieving greater autonomy and intelligence in
robotics has led to high levels of complexity. Autonomous robots increasingly
depend on third party off-the-shelf components and complex machine-learning
techniques. This trend makes it challenging to provide strong design-time
certification of correct operation.
To address these challenges, we present SOTER, a robotics programming
framework with two key components: (1) a programming language for implementing
and testing high-level reactive robotics software and (2) an integrated runtime
assurance (RTA) system that helps enable the use of uncertified components,
while still providing safety guarantees. SOTER provides language primitives to
declaratively construct a RTA module consisting of an advanced,
high-performance controller (uncertified), a safe, lower-performance controller
(certified), and the desired safety specification. The framework provides a
formal guarantee that a well-formed RTA module always satisfies the safety
specification, without completely sacrificing performance by using higher
performance uncertified components whenever safe. SOTER allows the complex
robotics software stack to be constructed as a composition of RTA modules,
where each uncertified component is protected using a RTA module.
To demonstrate the efficacy of our framework, we consider a real-world
case-study of building a safe drone surveillance system. Our experiments both
in simulation and on actual drones show that the SOTER-enabled RTA ensures the
safety of the system, including when untrusted third-party components have bugs
or deviate from the desired behavior
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