A graph-based mathematical morphology reader

This survey paper aims at providing a "literary" anthology of mathematical morphology on graphs. It describes in the English language many ideas stemming from a large number of different papers, hence providing a unified view of an active and diverse field of research

Structural optimisation of random discontinuous fibre composites: Part 1 – Methodology

This paper presents a finite element model to optimise the fibre architecture of components manufactured from discontinuous fibre composites. An optimality criterion method has been developed to maximise global component stiffness, by determining optimum distributions for local section thickness and preform areal mass. The model is demonstrated by optimising the bending performance of a flat plate with three holes. Results are presented from a sensitivity study to highlight the level of compromise in stiffness optimisation caused by manufacturing constraints associated with the fibre deposition method, such as the scale of component features relative to the fibre length

Distributed Spacing Stochastic Feature Selection and its Application to Textile Classification

Many situations require the need to quickly and accurately locate dismounted individuals in a variety of environments. In conjunction with other dismount detection techniques, being able to detect and classify clothing (textiles) provides a more comprehensive and complete dismount characterization capability. Because textile classification depends on distinguishing between different material types, hyperspectral data, which consists of several hundred spectral channels sampled from a continuous electromagnetic spectrum, is used as a data source. However, a hyperspectral image generates vast amounts of information and can be computationally intractable to analyze. A primary means to reduce the computational complexity is to use feature selection to identify a reduced set of features that effectively represents a specific class. While many feature selection methods exist, applying them to continuous data results in closely clustered feature sets that offer little redundancy and fail in the presence of noise. This dissertation presents a novel feature selection method that limits feature redundancy and improves classification. This method uses a stochastic search algorithm in conjunction with a heuristic that combines measures of distance and dependence to select features. Comparison testing between the presented feature selection method and existing methods uses hyperspectral data and image wavelet decompositions. The presented method produces feature sets with an average correlation of 0.40-0.54. This is significantly lower than the 0.70-0.99 of the existing feature selection methods. In terms of classification accuracy, the feature sets produced outperform those of other methods, to a significance of 0.025, and show greater robustness under noise representative of a hyperspectral imaging system

Redesigning the human-robot interface : intuitive teleoperation of anthropomorphic robots

textA novel interface for robotic teleoperation was developed to enable accurate and highly efficient teleoperation of the Industrial Reconfigurable Anthropomorphic Dual-arm (IRAD) system and other robotic systems. In order to achieve a revolutionary increase in operator productivity, the bilateral/master-slave approach must give way to shared autonomy and unilateral control; autonomy must be employed where possible, and appropriate sensory feedback only where autonomy is impossible; and today’s low-information/high feedback model must be replaced by one that emphasizes feedforward precision and minimal corrective feedback. This is emphasized for task spaces outside of the traditional anthropomorphic scale such as mobile manipulation (i.e. large task spaces) and high precision tasks (i.e. very small task spaces). The system is demonstrated using an anthropomorphically dimensioned industrial manipulator working in task spaces from one meter to less than one millimeter, in both simulation and hardware. This thesis discusses the design requirements and philosophy of this interface, provides a summary of prototype teleoperation hardware, simulation environment, test-bed hardware, and experimental results.Mechanical Engineerin