Urban robotic experimentation: San Francisco, Tokyo and Dubai

Advances in robotics, artificial intelligence and automation have the potential to transform cities and urban social life. However, robotic restructuring of the city is complicated and contested. Technology is still evolving, robotic infrastructure is expensive and there are technical, trust and safety challenges in bringing robots into dynamic urban environments alongside humans. This article examines the nascent field of ‘urban robotics’ in three emblematic yet diverse national-urban contexts that are leading centres for urban robotic experimentation. Focusing on the experimental application of autonomous social robots, the article explores: (i) the rationale for urban robotic experiments and the interests involved, and (ii) the challenges and outcomes of creating meaningful urban spaces for robotic experimentation. The article makes a distinctive contribution to urban research by illuminating a potentially far-reaching but under-researched area of urban policy. It provides a conceptual framework for mapping and understanding the highly contingent, spatially uneven and socially selective processes of robotic urban experimentation

Artificial intelligence and robotics in smart city strategies and planned smart development

Smart city strategies developed by cities around the world provide a useful resource for insights into the future of smart development. This study examines such strategies to identify plans for the explicit deployment of artificial intelligence (AI) and robotics. A total of 12 case studies emerged from an online keyword search representing cities of various sizes globally. The search was based on the keywords of “artificial intelligence” (or “AI”), and “robot,” representing robotics and associated terminology. Based on the findings, it is evident that the more concentrated deployment of AI and robotics in smart city development is currently in the Global North, although countries in the Global South are also increasingly represented. Multiple cities in Australia and Canada actively seek to develop AI and robotics, and Moscow has one of the most in-depth elaborations for this deployment. The ramifications of these plans are discussed as part of cyber–physical systems alongside consideration given to the social and ethical implications

The UAVs threat to airport security: risk analysis and mitigation

Purpose: This research studies the UAV incidents in the vicinity of worldwide airports in order to deliver a quantitative and qualitative analysis of this phaenomenon, to analyse the risks associated to this threat and propose mitigation measures that brings this risk to an ‘acceptable’ level. Methodology: A population of 139 ‘serious UAV incidents in the vicinity of worldwide airports’ has been constituted on the basis of the FAA and NASA databases and articles published on the Web by online media. This phaenomenon has then been analysed quantitatively using descriptive statistics techniques and qualitatively by analysing in-depth some representative incidents. A risk analysis has then been performed based on the FAA Safety Risk Management 5-steps process to identify the hazards i.e. the root causes of those UAV incidents, determine their outcome i.e. negative consequences that jeopardize airports objectives and assign them a severity level and likelihood i.e. frequency level. Analysed risks have then been assessed based on FAA ARP Risk Matrix. Mitigation measures (prevention, deterrence, denial, detection, neutralisation) have been identified following a ‘Defence-in-Depth’ approach. Findings: The findings of the study are that those UAV incidents are more numerous than anticipated and happen higher and further from the airports than expected: they happen not only in CTRs but also in TMAs. This has an impact on the mitigation measures that shall not only be deployed at airports side but also be on-boarded in manned aircrafts. Originality: To our knowledge, no study has combined different sources to constitute such a population focused on ‘serious’ UAVs incidents around airports worldwide, has applied the official FAA Safety Risk Management process to assess this risk and followed a structured ‘Defence-in-Depth’ approach typically used in Cybersecurity to mitigate this risk.Peer Reviewe

Robotics and automation in the city: a research agenda

Globally cities are becoming experimental sites for new forms of robotic and automation technologies applied across a wide variety of sectors in multiple areas of economic and social life. As these innovations leave the laboratory and factory, this paper analyses how robotics and automation systems are being layered upon existing urban digital networks, extending the capabilities and capacities of human agency and infrastructure networks, and reshaping the city and citizen’s everyday experiences. To date, most work in this field has been speculative and isolated in nature. We set out a research agenda that goes beyond analysis of discrete applications and effects, to investigate how robotics and automation connect across urban domains and the implications for: differential urban geographies, the selective enhancement of individuals and collective management of infrastructures, the socio-spatial sorting of cities and the potential for responsible urban innovation

Cyber physical systems: A smart city perspective

Cyber-physical system (CPS) is a terminology used to describe multiple systems of existing infrastructure and manufacturing system that combines computing technologies (cyber space) into the physical space to integrate human interaction. This paper does a literature review of the work related to CPS in terms of its importance in today’s world. Further, this paper also looks at the importance of CPS and its relationship with internet of things (IoT). CPS is a very broad area and is used in variety of fields and some of these major fields are evaluated. Additionally, the implementation of CPS and IoT is major enabler for smart cities and various examples of such implementation in the context of Dubai and UAE are researched. Finally, security issues related to CPS in general are also reviewed

Communication and Control in Collaborative UAVs: Recent Advances and Future Trends

The recent progress in unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV) technology has significantly advanced UAV-based applications for military, civil, and commercial domains. Nevertheless, the challenges of establishing high-speed communication links, flexible control strategies, and developing efficient collaborative decision-making algorithms for a swarm of UAVs limit their autonomy, robustness, and reliability. Thus, a growing focus has been witnessed on collaborative communication to allow a swarm of UAVs to coordinate and communicate autonomously for the cooperative completion of tasks in a short time with improved efficiency and reliability. This work presents a comprehensive review of collaborative communication in a multi-UAV system. We thoroughly discuss the characteristics of intelligent UAVs and their communication and control requirements for autonomous collaboration and coordination. Moreover, we review various UAV collaboration tasks, summarize the applications of UAV swarm networks for dense urban environments and present the use case scenarios to highlight the current developments of UAV-based applications in various domains. Finally, we identify several exciting future research direction that needs attention for advancing the research in collaborative UAVs

Shared-Control for a UAV Operating in the 3D Space

This paper presents a shared-control scheme for a UAV moving in a 3D space while its feasible Cartesian position set is defined by a group of linear inequalities. A hysteresis switch is used to combine the human input and the feedback control input based on the definitions of a safe set, a hysteresis set and a “dangerous” set. Case studies given in the paper show the effectiveness of the shared-control algorithm

Road Traffic Management using Vehicle-to- Everything (V2X) Communication

Traffic congestion is the primary concern in dense cities; while the increased number of automobiles is becoming uncontrollable in some cities, it is more challenging to manage or change how people use cars. To contribute to solving traffic congestion in cities, this project examines the study of transferring vehicles to be competent in a way that can help the government entities analyze the received vehicles’ data and for better decisions on reducing traffic congestion as well as the real-time monitoring of traffic wherever it is located using the Vehicle-to-Everything (V2X) communication methodology. This study proposes a hardware “system” that can be attached to any vehicle to collect real-time data from vehicles and communicate with the Road and Transportation Authority. The hardware system, however, is connected to the cars through a wireless On-Board Diagnostics (OBD) connection in favor of collecting all the necessary information from the vehicle, such as the car speed and Revolutions Per Minute (RPM) data. On the other hand, a GPS sensor is used to inquire about the vehicle’s location, a GSM module to make sure the device is always connected to the internet for data transmission, a LiDAR sensor for distance and safety measurement, and a camera module accessed only by the driver for object detection such as cars, pedestrians, traffic signs, damaged roads, and road hazards. Moreover, system updates and maintenance can be done remotely to reduce the number of visits to the traffic department since all devices are to be connected to a single platform. As a result, it was possible to create a prototype for a single vehicle, including the sensors mentioned above, returning valuable data that include vehicle speed and exact location, which will help future researchers develop an application platform to monitor and track traffic congestion in real time

A Speculative Study on 6G

While 5G is being tested worldwide and anticipated to be rolled out gradually in 2019, researchers around the world are beginning to turn their attention to what 6G might be in 10+ years time, and there are already initiatives in various countries focusing on the research of possible 6G technologies. This article aims to extend the vision of 5G to more ambitious scenarios in a more distant future and speculates on the visionary technologies that could provide the step changes needed for enabling 6G.Comment: This work has been submitted to the IEEE for possible publication. Copyright may be transferred without notice, after which this version mayno longer be accessibl