Pedagogical Possibilities for the N-Puzzle Problem

In this paper we present work on a project funded by the National Science Foundation with a goal of unifying the Artificial Intelligence (AI) course around the theme of machine learning. Our work involves the development and testing of an adaptable framework for the presentation of core AI topics that emphasizes the relationship between AI and computer science. Several hands-on laboratory projects that can be closely integrated into an introductory AI course have been developed. We present an overview of one of the projects and describe the associated curricular materials that have been developed. The project uses machine learning as a theme to unify core AI topics in the context of the N-puzzle game. Games provide a rich framework to introduce students to search fundamentals and other core AI concepts. The paper presents several pedagogical possibilities for the N-puzzle game, the rich challenge it offers, and summarizes our experiences using it

Problem-Solving Knowledge Mining from Users’\ud Actions in an Intelligent Tutoring System

In an intelligent tutoring system (ITS), the domain expert should provide\ud relevant domain knowledge to the tutor so that it will be able to guide the\ud learner during problem solving. However, in several domains, this knowledge is\ud not predetermined and should be captured or learned from expert users as well as\ud intermediate and novice users. Our hypothesis is that, knowledge discovery (KD)\ud techniques can help to build this domain intelligence in ITS. This paper proposes\ud a framework to capture problem-solving knowledge using a promising approach\ud of data and knowledge discovery based on a combination of sequential pattern\ud mining and association rules discovery techniques. The framework has been implemented\ud and is used to discover new meta knowledge and rules in a given domain\ud which then extend domain knowledge and serve as problem space allowing\ud the intelligent tutoring system to guide learners in problem-solving situations.\ud Preliminary experiments have been conducted using the framework as an alternative\ud to a path-planning problem solver in CanadarmTutor

Neural Networks in Mobile Robot Motion

This paper deals with a path planning and intelligent control of an autonomous robot which should move safely in partially structured environment. This environment may involve any number of obstacles of arbitrary shape and size; some of them are allowed to move. We describe our approach to solving the motion-planning problem in mobile robot control using neural networks-based technique. Our method of the construction of a collision-free path for moving robot among obstacles is based on two neural networks. The first neural network is used to determine the "free" space using ultrasound range finder data. The second neural network "finds" a safe direction for the next robot section of the path in the workspace while avoiding the nearest obstacles. Simulation examples of generated path with proposed techniques will be presented.Comment: 9 Page

Multi-population genetic algorithms with immigrants scheme for dynamic shortest path routing problems in mobile ad hoc networks

Copyright @ Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 2010.The static shortest path (SP) problem has been well addressed using intelligent optimization techniques, e.g., artificial neural networks, genetic algorithms (GAs), particle swarm optimization, etc. However, with the advancement in wireless communications, more and more mobile wireless networks appear, e.g., mobile ad hoc network (MANET), wireless mesh network, etc. One of the most important characteristics in mobile wireless networks is the topology dynamics, that is, the network topology changes over time due to energy conservation or node mobility. Therefore, the SP problem turns out to be a dynamic optimization problem in mobile wireless networks. In this paper, we propose to use multi-population GAs with immigrants scheme to solve the dynamic SP problem in MANETs which is the representative of new generation wireless networks. The experimental results show that the proposed GAs can quickly adapt to the environmental changes (i.e., the network topology change) and produce good solutions after each change.This work was supported by the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council(EPSRC) of UK under Grant EP/E060722/1

Practical application of pseudospectral optimization to robot path planning

To obtain minimum time or minimum energy trajectories for robots it is necessary to employ planning methods which adequately consider the platform’s dynamic properties. A variety of sampling, graph-based or local receding-horizon optimisation methods have previously been proposed. These typically use simplified kino-dynamic models to avoid the significant computational burden of solving this problem in a high dimensional state-space. In this paper we investigate solutions from the class of pseudospectral optimisation methods which have grown in favour amongst the optimal control community in recent years. These methods have high computational efficiency and rapid convergence properties. We present a practical application of such an approach to the robot path planning problem to provide a trajectory considering the robot’s dynamic properties. We extend the existing literature by augmenting the path constraints with sensed obstacles rather than predefined analytical functions to enable real world application