5,617 research outputs found
Magnetic-Visual Sensor Fusion-based Dense 3D Reconstruction and Localization for Endoscopic Capsule Robots
Reliable and real-time 3D reconstruction and localization functionality is a
crucial prerequisite for the navigation of actively controlled capsule
endoscopic robots as an emerging, minimally invasive diagnostic and therapeutic
technology for use in the gastrointestinal (GI) tract. In this study, we
propose a fully dense, non-rigidly deformable, strictly real-time,
intraoperative map fusion approach for actively controlled endoscopic capsule
robot applications which combines magnetic and vision-based localization, with
non-rigid deformations based frame-to-model map fusion. The performance of the
proposed method is demonstrated using four different ex-vivo porcine stomach
models. Across different trajectories of varying speed and complexity, and four
different endoscopic cameras, the root mean square surface reconstruction
errors 1.58 to 2.17 cm.Comment: submitted to IROS 201
A Framework for SAR-Optical Stereogrammetry over Urban Areas
Currently, numerous remote sensing satellites provide a huge volume of
diverse earth observation data. As these data show different features regarding
resolution, accuracy, coverage, and spectral imaging ability, fusion techniques
are required to integrate the different properties of each sensor and produce
useful information. For example, synthetic aperture radar (SAR) data can be
fused with optical imagery to produce 3D information using stereogrammetric
methods. The main focus of this study is to investigate the possibility of
applying a stereogrammetry pipeline to very-high-resolution (VHR) SAR-optical
image pairs. For this purpose, the applicability of semi-global matching is
investigated in this unconventional multi-sensor setting. To support the image
matching by reducing the search space and accelerating the identification of
correct, reliable matches, the possibility of establishing an epipolarity
constraint for VHR SAR-optical image pairs is investigated as well. In
addition, it is shown that the absolute geolocation accuracy of VHR optical
imagery with respect to VHR SAR imagery such as provided by TerraSAR-X can be
improved by a multi-sensor block adjustment formulation based on rational
polynomial coefficients. Finally, the feasibility of generating point clouds
with a median accuracy of about 2m is demonstrated and confirms the potential
of 3D reconstruction from SAR-optical image pairs over urban areas.Comment: This is the pre-acceptance version, to read the final version, please
go to ISPRS Journal of Photogrammetry and Remote Sensing on ScienceDirec
Autonomous Tissue Scanning under Free-Form Motion for Intraoperative Tissue Characterisation
In Minimally Invasive Surgery (MIS), tissue scanning with imaging probes is
required for subsurface visualisation to characterise the state of the tissue.
However, scanning of large tissue surfaces in the presence of deformation is a
challenging task for the surgeon. Recently, robot-assisted local tissue
scanning has been investigated for motion stabilisation of imaging probes to
facilitate the capturing of good quality images and reduce the surgeon's
cognitive load. Nonetheless, these approaches require the tissue surface to be
static or deform with periodic motion. To eliminate these assumptions, we
propose a visual servoing framework for autonomous tissue scanning, able to
deal with free-form tissue deformation. The 3D structure of the surgical scene
is recovered and a feature-based method is proposed to estimate the motion of
the tissue in real-time. A desired scanning trajectory is manually defined on a
reference frame and continuously updated using projective geometry to follow
the tissue motion and control the movement of the robotic arm. The advantage of
the proposed method is that it does not require the learning of the tissue
motion prior to scanning and can deal with free-form deformation. We deployed
this framework on the da Vinci surgical robot using the da Vinci Research Kit
(dVRK) for Ultrasound tissue scanning. Since the framework does not rely on
information from the Ultrasound data, it can be easily extended to other
probe-based imaging modalities.Comment: 7 pages, 5 figures, ICRA 202
A Time-Evolving 3D Method Dedicated to the Reconstruction of Solar plumes and Results Using Extreme Ultra-Violet Data
An important issue in the tomographic reconstruction of the solar poles is
the relatively rapid evolution of the polar plumes. We demonstrate that it is
possible to take into account this temporal evolution in the reconstruction.
The difficulty of this problem comes from the fact that we want a 4D
reconstruction (three spatial dimensions plus time) while we only have 3D data
(2D images plus time). To overcome this difficulty, we introduce a model that
describes polar plumes as stationary objects whose intensity varies
homogeneously with time. This assumption can be physically justified if one
accepts the stability of the magnetic structure. This model leads to a bilinear
inverse problem. We describe how to extend linear inversion methods to these
kinds of problems. Studies of simulations show the reliability of our method.
Results for SOHO/EIT data show that we are able to estimate the temporal
evolution of polar plumes in order to improve the reconstruction of the solar
poles from only one point of view. We expect further improvements from
STEREO/EUVI data when the two probes will be separated by about 60 degrees
Driven to Distraction: Self-Supervised Distractor Learning for Robust Monocular Visual Odometry in Urban Environments
We present a self-supervised approach to ignoring "distractors" in camera
images for the purposes of robustly estimating vehicle motion in cluttered
urban environments. We leverage offline multi-session mapping approaches to
automatically generate a per-pixel ephemerality mask and depth map for each
input image, which we use to train a deep convolutional network. At run-time we
use the predicted ephemerality and depth as an input to a monocular visual
odometry (VO) pipeline, using either sparse features or dense photometric
matching. Our approach yields metric-scale VO using only a single camera and
can recover the correct egomotion even when 90% of the image is obscured by
dynamic, independently moving objects. We evaluate our robust VO methods on
more than 400km of driving from the Oxford RobotCar Dataset and demonstrate
reduced odometry drift and significantly improved egomotion estimation in the
presence of large moving vehicles in urban traffic.Comment: International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA), 2018.
Video summary: http://youtu.be/ebIrBn_nc-
Improved GelSight Tactile Sensor for Measuring Geometry and Slip
A GelSight sensor uses an elastomeric slab covered with a reflective membrane
to measure tactile signals. It measures the 3D geometry and contact force
information with high spacial resolution, and successfully helped many
challenging robot tasks. A previous sensor, based on a semi-specular membrane,
produces high resolution but with limited geometry accuracy. In this paper, we
describe a new design of GelSight for robot gripper, using a Lambertian
membrane and new illumination system, which gives greatly improved geometric
accuracy while retaining the compact size. We demonstrate its use in measuring
surface normals and reconstructing height maps using photometric stereo. We
also use it for the task of slip detection, using a combination of information
about relative motions on the membrane surface and the shear distortions. Using
a robotic arm and a set of 37 everyday objects with varied properties, we find
that the sensor can detect translational and rotational slip in general cases,
and can be used to improve the stability of the grasp.Comment: IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Intelligent Robots and System
Influence of Stereoscopic Camera System Alignment Error on the Accuracy of 3D Reconstruction
The article deals with the influence of inaccurate rotation of cameras in camera system alignment on 3D reconstruction accuracy. The accuracy of the all three spatial coordinates is analyzed for two alignments (setups) of 3D cameras. In the first setup, a 3D system with parallel optical axes of the cameras is analyzed. In this stereoscopic setup, the deterministic relations are derived by the trigonometry and basic stereoscopic formulas. The second alignment is a generalized setup with cameras in arbitrary positions. The analysis of the situation in the general setup is closely related with the influence of errors of the points' correspondences. Therefore the relation between errors of points' correspondences and reconstruction of the spatial position of the point was investigated. This issue is very complex. The worst case analysis was executed with the use of Monte Carlo method. The aim is to estimate a critical situation and the possible extent of these errors. Analysis of the generalized system and derived relations for normal system represent a significant improvement of the spatial coordinates accuracy analysis. A practical experiment was executed which confirmed the proposed relations
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