31 research outputs found
Real-time 3D human tracking for mobile robots with multisensors
© 2017 IEEE. Acquiring the accurate 3-D position of a target person around a robot provides fundamental and valuable information that is applicable to a wide range of robotic tasks, including home service, navigation and entertainment. This paper presents a real-time robotic 3-D human tracking system which combines a monocular camera with an ultrasonic sensor by the extended Kalman filter (EKF). The proposed system consists of three sub-modules: monocular camera sensor tracking model, ultrasonic sensor tracking model and multi-sensor fusion. An improved visual tracking algorithm is presented to provide partial location estimation (2-D). The algorithm is designed to overcome severe occlusions, scale variation, target missing and achieve robust re-detection. The scale accuracy is further enhanced by the estimated 3-D information. An ultrasonic sensor array is employed to provide the range information from the target person to the robot and Gaussian Process Regression is used for partial location estimation (2-D). EKF is adopted to sequentially process multiple, heterogeneous measurements arriving in an asynchronous order from the vision sensor and the ultrasonic sensor separately. In the experiments, the proposed tracking system is tested in both simulation platform and actual mobile robot for various indoor and outdoor scenes. The experimental results show the superior performance of the 3-D tracking system in terms of both the accuracy and robustness
Vision technology/algorithms for space robotics applications
The thrust of automation and robotics for space applications has been proposed for increased productivity, improved reliability, increased flexibility, higher safety, and for the performance of automating time-consuming tasks, increasing productivity/performance of crew-accomplished tasks, and performing tasks beyond the capability of the crew. This paper provides a review of efforts currently in progress in the area of robotic vision. Both systems and algorithms are discussed. The evolution of future vision/sensing is projected to include the fusion of multisensors ranging from microwave to optical with multimode capability to include position, attitude, recognition, and motion parameters. The key feature of the overall system design will be small size and weight, fast signal processing, robust algorithms, and accurate parameter determination. These aspects of vision/sensing are also discussed
A Cost-Effective Person-Following System for Assistive Unmanned Vehicles with Deep Learning at the Edge
The vital statistics of the last century highlight a sharp increment of the
average age of the world population with a consequent growth of the number of
older people. Service robotics applications have the potentiality to provide
systems and tools to support the autonomous and self-sufficient older adults in
their houses in everyday life, thereby avoiding the task of monitoring them
with third parties. In this context, we propose a cost-effective modular
solution to detect and follow a person in an indoor, domestic environment. We
exploited the latest advancements in deep learning optimization techniques, and
we compared different neural network accelerators to provide a robust and
flexible person-following system at the edge. Our proposed cost-effective and
power-efficient solution is fully-integrable with pre-existing navigation
stacks and creates the foundations for the development of fully-autonomous and
self-contained service robotics applications
Graphite immobilisation in glass composite materials
Irradiated graphite is a problematic nuclear waste stream and currently raises significant concern
worldwide in identifying its long-term disposal route. This thesis describes the use of glass
materials for the immobilisation of irradiated graphite prepared by microwave, conventional and
sparks plasma sintering methods. Several potential glass compositions namely iron phosphate,
aluminoborosilicate, calcium aluminosilicate, alkali borosilicate and obsidian were considered
for the immobilisation of various loadings of graphite simulating irradiated graphite. The
properties of the samples produced using different processing methods are compared selectively.
An investigation of microwave processing using an iron phosphate glass composition revealed
that full reaction of the raw materials and formation of a glass melt occurs with consequent
removal of porosity at 8 minutes microwave processing. When graphite is present, iron
phosphate crystalline phases are formed with much higher levels of residual porosity of up to 43
% than in the samples prepared using conventional sintering under argon. It is found that
graphite reacts with the microwave field when in powder form but this reaction is minimised
when the graphite is incorporated into a pellet, and that the graphite also impedes sintering of the
glass. Mössbauer spectroscopy indicates that reduction of iron occurs with concomitant graphite
oxidation. The production of graphite-glass samples using various powdered glass compositions
by conventional sintering method still resulted in high porosity with an average of 6-17 % for
graphite loadings of 20-25 wt%. Due to the use of pre-made glasses and controlled sintering
parameters, the loss of graphite from the total mass is reduced compared to the microwaved
samples; the average mass loss is < 0.8 %. The complication of iron oxidation and reduction is
present in all the iron containing base glasses considered and this increases the total porosity of
the graphite-glass samples. It is concluded that the presence of iron in the raw materials or base
glasses as an encapsulation media for the immobilisation of the irradiated graphite waste is not
advisable. The production of glass and graphite-glass samples based calcium aluminosilicate
composition by spark plasma sintering method is found highly suitable for the immobilisation of
irradiated graphite wastes. The advantages of the method includes short processing time i.e. < 40
minutes, improved sintering transport mechanisms, limited graphite oxidation, low porosity (1-4
%) and acceptable tensile strength (2-7 MPa). The most promising samples prepared using spark
plasma sintering method were loaded with 30-50 wt% graphite
Improving Model Drift for Robust Object Tracking
Discriminative correlation filters show excellent performance in object
tracking. However, in complex scenes, the apparent characteristics of the
tracked target are variable, which makes it easy to pollute the model and cause
the model drift. In this paper, considering that the secondary peak has a
greater impact on the model update, we propose a method for detecting the
primary and secondary peaks of the response map. Secondly, a novel confidence
function which uses the adaptive update discriminant mechanism is proposed,
which yield good robustness. Thirdly, we propose a robust tracker with
correlation filters, which uses hand-crafted features and can improve model
drift in complex scenes. Finally, in order to cope with the current trackers'
multi-feature response merge, we propose a simple exponential adaptive merge
approach. Extensive experiments are performed on OTB2013, OTB100 and TC128
datasets. Our approach performs superiorly against several state-of-the-art
trackers while runs at speed in real time.Comment: 7 pages, 6 figures, 4 table
Next generation main battle tank. Part II: Converting old MBTS into unmanned MBTS (UMBT)
Modern MBTs (Main Battle Tank) are extremely expensive. Many outdated MBTs and other armored vehicles,
often lacking the required armor protection, are still kept in depots. It is now convenient to upgrade them to optionally
unmanned weapons by adding a humanoid driver, and a robotic arm as a loader. Sensors, an optional automatic driving
system, a control and communication suite would complete the transformation. The main armament and secondary
armament may be also changed or upgraded. The off-the-shelf huge electronic equipment can be installed wireless inside
the hull. The old crew compartment may be spoiled of all the human related parts. Only the driver seat may be kept in
order to leave the capability to remove the humanoid, robotized driver and reinstate the human one. This upgrade should
also include a diagnostic system for the vehicle, the sensors and the additional systems to reduce the maintenance burden.
An additional, specialized, lightweight armor suite should be focused to protect the mobilization system, the robots, the
control and the communication system. This second part of the paper introduces a few options to convert the Leopard 1
MBT to an optionally piloted UMBT (Unmanned Main Battle Tank). A first, minimal step, is just the automation of the
original tank. In a second step, the weight is reduced by installing a smaller 60mm cannon with a lighter, but more
numerous ammunition storage. A third step increases the firepower by installing on the main turret an automated turret
with a 12.7 or 30mm cannon with an optional additional 7.62 machinegun. It is also highly advisable to add an APU
(Auxiliary Power Unit) and a battery to reduce IR (infrared) signature, improve main engine life and reduce maintenance