Honeycomb map: a bioinspired topological map for indoor search and rescue unmanned aerial vehicles

The use of robots to map disaster-stricken environments can prevent rescuers from being harmed when exploring an unknown space. In addition, mapping a multi-robot environment can help these teams plan their actions with prior knowledge. The present work proposes the use of multiple unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) in the construction of a topological map inspired by the way that bees build their hives. A UAV can map a honeycomb only if it is adjacent to a known one. Different metrics to choose the honeycomb to be explored were applied. At the same time, as UAVs scan honeycomb adjacencies, RGB-D and thermal sensors capture other data types, and then generate a 3D view of the space and images of spaces where there may be fire spots, respectively. Simulations in different environments showed that the choice of metric and variation in the number of UAVs influence the number of performed displacements in the environment, consequently affecting exploration time and energy use.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Cluster Control of a Multi-Robot Tracking Network and Tracking Geometry Optimization

The position of a moving object can be tracked in numerous ways, the simplest of which is to use a single static sensor. However, the information from a single sensor cannot be verified and may not be reliable without performing multiple measurements of the same object. When multiple static sensors are used, each sensor need only take a single measurement which can be combined with other sensor measurements to produce a more accurate position estimate. Work has been done to develop sensors that move with the tracked object, such as relative positioning, but this research takes this concept one step further; this dissertation presents a novel, highly capable strategy for utilizing a multi-robot network to track a moving target. The method optimizes the configuration of mobile tracking stations in order to produce the position estimate for a target object that yields the smallest estimation error, even when the sensor performance varies. The simulations and experiments presented here verify that the optimization process works in the real world, even under changing conditions and noisy sensor data. This demonstrates a simple, robust system that can accurately follow a moving object, as illustrated by results from both simulations and physical experiments. Further, the optimization led to a 6% improvement in the target location estimate over the non-optimized worst-case scenario tested with identical sensors at the nominal fixed radius distance of 2.83 m and even more significant improvements of over 90% at larger radial distances. This method can be applied to a wider variety of conditions than current methods since it does not require a Kalman filter and is able to find an optimal solution for the fixed radius case. To make this optimization method even more useful, it is proposed to extend the mathematical framework to n robots and extend the mathematical framework to three dimensions. It is also proposed to combine the effect of position uncertainty in the tracking system with position uncertainty of the tracking stations themselves in the analysis in order to better account for real-world conditions. Additionally, testing should be extended to different platforms with different sensors to further explore the applicability of this optimization method. Finally, it is proposed to modify the optimization method to compensate for the dynamics of the system so that sensor systems could move into an intercept course that would result in the optimal configuration about the tracked object at the desired time step. These proposals would result in a more applicable and robust system than is currently available

Robust Intelligent Sensing and Control Multi Agent Analysis Platform for Research and Education

The aim of this thesis is the development and implementation of a controlled testing platform for the Robust Intelligent Sensing and Controls (RISC) Lab at Utah State University (USU). This will be an open source adaptable expandable robotics platform usable for both education and research. This differs from the many other platforms developed in that the entire platform software will be made open source. This open source software will encourage collaboration among other universities and enable researchers to essentially pick up where others have left off without the necessity of replicating months or even years of work. The expected results of this research will create a foundation for diverse robotics investigation at USU as well as enable attempts at novel methods of control, estimation and optimization. This will also contribute a complete software testbed setup to the already vibrant robotics open source research community. This thesis first outlines the platform setup and novel developments therein. The second stage provides an example of how this has been used in education, providing an example curriculum implementing modern control techniques. The third section provides some exploratory research in trajectory control and state estimation of the tip of an inverted pendulum atop a small unmanned aerial vehicle as well as bearing-only cooperative localization experimentation. Finally, a conclusion and future work is discussed

Lifelong Reinforcement Learning On Mobile Robots

Machine learning has shown tremendous growth in the past decades, unlocking new capabilities in a variety of fields including computer vision, natural language processing, and robotic control. While the sophistication of individual problems a learning system can handle has greatly advanced, the ability of a system to extend beyond an individual problem to adapt and solve new problems has progressed more slowly. This thesis explores the problem of progressive learning. The goal is to develop methodologies that accumulate, transfer, and adapt knowledge in applied settings where the system is faced with the ambiguity and resource limitations of operating in the physical world. There are undoubtedly many challenges to designing such a system, my thesis looks at the component of this problem related to how knowledge from previous tasks can be a benefit in the domain of reinforcement learning where the agent receives rewards for positive actions. Reinforcement learning is particularly difficult when training on physical systems, like mobile robots, where repeated trials can damage the system and unrestricted exploration is often associated with safety risks. I investigate how knowledge can be efficiently accumulated and applied to future reinforcement learning problems on mobile robots in order to reduce sample complexity and enable systems to adapt to novel settings. Doing this involves mathematical models which can combine knowledge from multiple tasks, methods for restructuring optimizations and data collection to handle sequential updates, and data selection strategies that can be used to address resource limitations

Multi-robot Collaborative Visual Navigation with Micro Aerial Vehicles

Micro Aerial Vehicles (MAVs), particularly multi-rotor MAVs have gained significant popularity in the autonomous robotics research field. The small size and agility of these aircraft makes them safe to use in contained environments. As such MAVs have numerous applications with respect to both the commercial and research fields, such as Search and Rescue (SaR), surveillance, inspection and aerial mapping. In order for an autonomous MAV to safely and reliably navigate within a given environment the control system must be able to determine the state of the aircraft at any given moment. The state consists of a number of extrinsic variables such as the position, velocity and attitude of the MAV. The most common approach for outdoor operations is the Global Positioning System (GPS). While GPS has been widely used for long range navigation in open environments, its performance degrades significantly in constrained environments and is unusable indoors. As a result state estimation for MAVs in such constrained environments is a popular and exciting research area. Many successful solutions have been developed using laser-range finder sensors. These sensors provide very accurate measurements at the cost of increased power and weight requirements. Cameras offer an attractive alternative state estimation sensor; they offer high information content per image coupled with light weight and low power consumption. As a result much recent work has focused on state estimation on MAVs where a camera is the only exteroceptive sensor. Much of this recent work focuses on single MAVs, however it is the author's belief that the full potential and benefits of the MAV platform can only be realised when teams of MAVs are able to cooperatively perform tasks such as SaR or mapping. Therefore the work presented in this thesis focuses on the problem of vision-based navigation for MAVs from a multi-robot perspective. Multi-robot visual navigation presents a number of challenges, as not only must the MAVs be able to estimate their state from visual observations of the environment but they must also be able to share the information they gain about their environment with other members of the team in a meaningful fashion. The meaningful sharing of observations is achieved when the MAVs have a common frame of reference for both positioning and observations. Such meaningful information sharing is key to achieving cooperative multi-robot navigation. In this thesis two main ideas are explored to address these issues. Firstly the idea of appearance based (re)-localisation is explored as a means of establishing a common reference frame for multiple MAVs. This approach allows a team of MAVs to very easily establish a common frame of reference prior to starting their mission. The common reference frame allows all subsequent operations, such as surveillance or mapping, to proceed with direct cooperative between all MAVs. The second idea focuses on the structure and nature of the inter-robot communication with respect to visual navigation; the thesis explores how a partially distributed architecture can be used to vastly improve the scalability and robustness of a multi-MAV visual navigation framework. A navigation framework would not be complete without a means of control. In the multi-robot setting the control problem is complicated by the need for inter-robot collision avoidance. This thesis presents a MAV trajectory controller based on a combination of classical control theory and distributed Velocity Obstacle (VO) based collision avoidance. Once a means of control is established an autonomous multi-MAV team requires a mission. One such mission is the task of exploration; that is exploration of a previously unknown environment in order to produce a map and/or search for objects of interest. This thesis also addressed the problem of multi-robot exploration using only the sparse interest-point data collected from the visual navigation system. In a multi-MAV exploration scenario the problem of task allocation, assigning areas to each MAV to explore, can be a challenging one. An auction-based protocol is considered to address the task allocation problem. The two applications discussed, VO-based trajectory control and auction-based environment exploration, form two case studies which serve as the partial basis of the evaluation of the navigation solutions presented in this thesis. In summary the visual navigation systems presented in this thesis allow MAVs to cooperatively perform task such as collision avoidance and environment exploration in a robust and efficient manner, with large teams of MAVs. The work presented is a step in the direction of fully autonomous teams of MAVs performing complex, dangerous and useful tasks in the real world

UAV or Drones for Remote Sensing Applications in GPS/GNSS Enabled and GPS/GNSS Denied Environments

The design of novel UAV systems and the use of UAV platforms integrated with robotic sensing and imaging techniques, as well as the development of processing workflows and the capacity of ultra-high temporal and spatial resolution data, have enabled a rapid uptake of UAVs and drones across several industries and application domains.This book provides a forum for high-quality peer-reviewed papers that broaden awareness and understanding of single- and multiple-UAV developments for remote sensing applications, and associated developments in sensor technology, data processing and communications, and UAV system design and sensing capabilities in GPS-enabled and, more broadly, Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS)-enabled and GPS/GNSS-denied environments.Contributions include:UAV-based photogrammetry, laser scanning, multispectral imaging, hyperspectral imaging, and thermal imaging;UAV sensor applications; spatial ecology; pest detection; reef; forestry; volcanology; precision agriculture wildlife species tracking; search and rescue; target tracking; atmosphere monitoring; chemical, biological, and natural disaster phenomena; fire prevention, flood prevention; volcanic monitoring; pollution monitoring; microclimates; and land use;Wildlife and target detection and recognition from UAV imagery using deep learning and machine learning techniques;UAV-based change detection

Supporting Validation of UAV Sense-and-Avoid Algorithms with Agent-Based Simulation and Evolutionary Search

A Sense-and-Avoid (SAA) capability is required for the safe integration of Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) into civilian airspace. Given their safety-critical nature, SAA algorithms must undergo rigorous verification and validation before deployment. The validation of UAV SAA algorithms requires identifying challenging situations that the algorithms have difficulties in handling. By building on ideas from Search-Based Software Testing, this thesis proposes an evolutionary-search-based approach that automatically identifies such situations to support the validation of SAA algorithms. Specifically, in the proposed approach, the behaviours of UAVs under the control of selected SAA algorithms are examined with agent-based simulations. Evolutionary search is used to guide the simulations to focus on increasingly challenging situations in a large search space defined by (the variations of) parameters that configure the simulations. An open-source tool has been developed to support the proposed approach so that the process can be partially automated. Positive results were achieved in a preliminary evaluation of the proposed approach using a simple two-dimensional SAA algorithm. The proposed approach was then further demonstrated and evaluated using two case studies, applying it to a prototype of an industry-level UAV collision avoidance algorithm (specifically, ACAS XU) and a multi-UAV conflict resolution algorithm (specifically, ORCA-3D). In the case studies, the proposed evolutionary-search-based approach was empirically compared with some plausible rivals (specifically, random-search-based approaches and a deterministic-global-search-based approach). The results show that the proposed approach can identify the required challenging situations more effectively and efficiently than the random-search-based approaches. The results also show that even though the proposed approach is a little less competitive than the deterministic-global-search-based approach in terms of effectiveness in relatively easy cases, it is more effective and efficient in more difficult cases, especially when the objective function becomes highly discontinuous. Thus, the proposed evolutionary-search-based approach has the potential to be used for supporting the validation of UAV SAA algorithms although it is not possible to show that it is the best approach

Um modelo de otimização para planejamento dinâmico de voo para grupos de drones por meio de sistema multiagente e leilões recursivos

Orientador: Eduardo TodtTese (doutorado) - Universidade Federal do Paraná, Setor de Ciências Exatas, Programa de Pós-Graduação em Informática. Defesa : Curitiba, 03/07/2020Inclui referênciasÁrea de concentração: Ciência da ComputaçãoResumo: Este trabalho apresenta um modelo aplicado de cooperacao para otimizar voos de veiculos aereos nao tripulados do tipo quadricoptero, tambem conhecidos como Drones, com aplicacao na agricultura de precisao. O modelo utiliza Sistema Multiagente para permitir a abertura, que e a propriedade de inserir e retirar elementos do modelo a qualquer momento. Para garantir a dinamicidade, que e a caracteristica que o modelo tem de se recuperar de eventos adversos ou falhas, agentes cognitivos com BDI foram utilizados. Para garantir a troca de mensagens independente da quantidade de elementos no modelo, foi utilizado o protocolo FIPA Contract-NET. Um algoritmo distribuido de otimizacao utilizando leiloes recursivos tambem foi desenvolvido, o qual visa otimizar o tempo de voo, assim como o uso da bateria dos Drones, sendo a bateria a grande limitacao destes e inibindo sua utilizacao na agricultura de precisao. Esse algoritmo foi testado em seu modelo original e, posteriormente, refinado a partir de heuristicas e metodologias visando diminuir o numero de leiloes recursivos, assim como o tempo de processamento, em comparacao ao modelo original. Este modelo, apos aplicacao das heuristicas e metodologias, foi testado. Em cenarios contendo multiplos Drones, o desempenho foi 30% superior ao algoritmo dinamico encontrado na literatura que tambem pode ser aplicado em ambientes dinamicos. Do ponto de vista de abertura e dinamicidade, o modelo foi testado no simulador MultiDrone Simulator, permitindo gerar novos planos de voo, mesmo com eventos adversos. Os resultados dos testes em simulacao realizados sustentam que o modelo proposto apresenta comportamento como esperado, mostrando-se como uma plataforma promissora de pesquisa para uso de Drones em cenarios da agricultura de precisao, uma vez que este modelo permite a utilizacao de multiplos Drones em ambientes dinamicos e abertos, garantindo a otimizacao do tempo de voo, o que garante economia da bateria dos Drones. Palavras-chave: Drones, Sistema Multiagente, BDI, Leilao RecursivoAbstract: This work presents an applied model of cooperation to optimize flights of unmanned aerial vehicles like quadcopters, also known as Drones, involved in precision agriculture. This model uses a Multiagent System to allow up the opening, which is the property of inserting and removing elements from the model at any time. To allow dynamism, which is the characteristic that the model has to recover from adverse events or failures, cognitive agents with BDI structure were used. To guarantee the exchange of messages in dynamic number of elements, the FIPA Contract-NET protocol were used. A distributed optimization algorithm using recursive auctions was also developed, which aims to optimize the number of points covered by Drones. This model aims to optimize the flight time, which directly reflects the optimization of the Drone's battery use. This is a great limitation of this kind of aerial vehicle and which inhibits its use in precision agriculture. This algorithm was tested as original proposed and, later, refined from heuristics and methodologies in order to decrease the number of auctions, as well as the processing time. This model, after applying the heuristics and methodologies, was tested, and in scenarios containing multiple Drones, the performance was 30 % higher than the dynamic algorithm found in the literature that can also be applied in dynamic environments. From the point of view of openness and dynamics, the model was tested in the MultiDrone Simulator, allowing to generate new flight plans, even with the simulated adverse events. The results of the simulation tests carried out maintain that the proposed model behaves as expected, showing itself as a promising research platform for the use of drones in precision agriculture scenarios, since this model allows the use of multiple Drones in environments dynamic and open, guaranteeing the flight optimization, which ensures battery saving for Drones. Keywords: Drones, Multiagent System, BDI, Recursive Auction