Tag Recognition for Quadcopter Drone Movement

Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) drone such as Parrot AR.Drone 2.0 is a flying mobile robot which has been popularly researched for the application of search and rescue mission. In this project, Robot Operating System (ROS), a free open source platform for developing robot control software is used to develop a tag recognition program for drone movement. ROS is popular with mobile robotics application development because sensors data transmission for robot control system analysis will be very handy with the use of ROS nodes and packages once the installation and compilation is done correctly. It is expected that the drone can communicate with a laptop via ROS nodes for sensors data transmission which will be further analyzed and processed for the close-loop control system. The developed program consisting of several packages is aimed to demonstrate the recognition of different tags by the drone which will be transformed into a movement command with respect to the tag recognized; in other words, a visual-based navigation program is developed

Formation control of nonholonomic mobile robots using implicit polynomials and elliptic Fourier descriptors

This paper presents a novel method for the formation control of a group of nonholonomic mobile robots using implicit and parametric descriptions of the desired formation shape. The formation control strategy employs implicit polynomial (IP) representations to generate potential fields for achieving the desired formation and the elliptical Fourier descriptors (EFD) to maintain the formation once achieved. Coordination of the robots is modeled by linear springs between each robot and its two nearest neighbors. Advantages of this new method are increased flexibility in the formation shape, scalability to different swarm sizes and easy implementation. The shape formation control is first developed for point particle robots and then extended to nonholonomic mobile robots. Several simulations with robot groups of different sizes are presented to validate our proposed approach

Mobile crawler robot vibration analysis in the contexts of motion speed selection

The article presents the methodology of body vibration analysis of an inspection robot with the use of flexible connection between the body and the track propulsion modules. The article presents the methodology of selection of motion parameters of an inspection robot, taking into account the vibration of the robot body. The speed of movement of the robot affects the frequency of contact track claws with the ground, which is related to the frequency of vibration excitation. Robot motion parameters are chosen in such a way so as not to over-stimulate the natural frequency of the system. Due to the vibration reduction, it was possible to install a visual system based on an Ethernet video camera without a stabilizer in the body of the robot. Such an approach enables mass production of robots without active suppression systems and video stabilizers which generate high production costs, increase weight of robots and energy consumption

Tag Recognition for Quadcopter Drone Movement

Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) drone such as Parrot AR.Drone 2.0 is a flying mobile robot which has been popularly researched for the application of search and rescue mission. In this project, Robot Operating System (ROS), a free open source platform for developing robot control software is used to develop a tag recognition program for drone movement. ROS is popular with mobile robotics application development because sensors data transmission for robot control system analysis will be very handy with the use of ROS nodes and packages once the installation and compilation is done correctly. It is expected that the drone can communicate with a laptop via ROS nodes for sensors data transmission which will be further analyzed and processed for the close-loop control system. The developed program consisting of several packages is aimed to demonstrate the recognition of different tags by the drone which will be transformed into a movement command with respect to the tag recognized; in other words, a visual-based navigation program is developed

Robotic Wireless Sensor Networks

In this chapter, we present a literature survey of an emerging, cutting-edge, and multi-disciplinary field of research at the intersection of Robotics and Wireless Sensor Networks (WSN) which we refer to as Robotic Wireless Sensor Networks (RWSN). We define a RWSN as an autonomous networked multi-robot system that aims to achieve certain sensing goals while meeting and maintaining certain communication performance requirements, through cooperative control, learning and adaptation. While both of the component areas, i.e., Robotics and WSN, are very well-known and well-explored, there exist a whole set of new opportunities and research directions at the intersection of these two fields which are relatively or even completely unexplored. One such example would be the use of a set of robotic routers to set up a temporary communication path between a sender and a receiver that uses the controlled mobility to the advantage of packet routing. We find that there exist only a limited number of articles to be directly categorized as RWSN related works whereas there exist a range of articles in the robotics and the WSN literature that are also relevant to this new field of research. To connect the dots, we first identify the core problems and research trends related to RWSN such as connectivity, localization, routing, and robust flow of information. Next, we classify the existing research on RWSN as well as the relevant state-of-the-arts from robotics and WSN community according to the problems and trends identified in the first step. Lastly, we analyze what is missing in the existing literature, and identify topics that require more research attention in the future

Estimação de verticalidade e estabilização de uma cabeça humanóide

Mestrado em Engenharia MecânicaO Projeto Humanóide da Universidade de Aveiro (PHUA) é a base desta dissertação que tem como objetivo estudar a estabilização da cabeça de um robô humanóide para efeitos de equilíbrio. Foram assim desenvolvidas soluções integradas usando o Robot Operating System (ROS). Para estabilizar a cabeça humanóide, foi estimado o vetor da gravidade (verticalidade) usando dados visuais. Para o fazer, duas soluções distintas foram abordadas, ambas baseadas na biblioteca Visual Servoing Platform (ViSP). Depois de estimada a verticalidade, a cabeça humanóide (uma câmara montada numa unidade roll-tilt) foi estabilizada recorrendo a um controlador proporcionalderivativo (PD) de posição para o servomotor responsável pelo ângulo roll e a um controlo PD de velocidade para o servomotor responsável pelo ângulo tilt. Para fazer as experiências, o sistema foi montado num manipulador robótico para permitir repetibilidade e controlo preciso de movimentos. A análise dos resultados das experiências mostra que quer a estimação da verticalidade quer a estabilização da cabeça humanóide foram tarefas realizadas com sucesso. Esta análise permite também concluir que a taxa de aquisição de imagem influencia os resultados, e que a limitada taxa do sistema usado (cerca de 15 imagens por segundo) condicionou um pouco a robustez dos resultados em situações mais exigentes.The Humanoid Project of the University of Aveiro (PHUA) is the basis of this dissertation, whose purpose is to study the effects of the stabilization of a humanoid head in obtaining its equilibrium. Therefore, integrated solutions using the Robot Operating System (ROS) were developed. To stabilize the humanoid head, the gravity vector (verticality) was estimated using visual data. In order to do so, two distinct solutions were approached, both based on the Visual Servoing Platform (ViSP) library. After estimating verticality, the humanoid head (a camera mounted on a roll-tilt unit) was stabilized using a proportional-derivative (PD) controller for the position of the servo responsible for the roll angle and a PD controller for the velocity of the servomotor responsible for the tilt angle. To perform the experiments, the system was mounted on a robotic manipulator to allow repeatability and precise movement control. An analysis to the experiment results shows that both the verticality estimation and head stabilization tasks were performed successfully. This analysis also allows for the conclusion that the image frame rate influences results, and that the limited frame rate of the system used (about 15 frames per second) slightly conditioned the robustness of results in more demanding scenarios

Formation control of nonholonomic mobile robots using implicit polynomials and elliptic Fourier descriptors

Abstract This paper presents a novel method for the formation control of a group of nonholonomic mobile robots using implicit and parametric descriptions of the desired formation shape. The formation control strategy employs implicit polynomial (IP) representations to generate potential fields for achieving the desired formation and the elliptical Fourier descriptors (EFD) to maintain the formation once achieved. Coordination of the robots is modeled by linear springs between each robot and its two nearest neighbors. Advantages of this new method are increased flexibility in the formatio

Aerial Tele-Manipulation with Passive Tool via Parallel Position/Force Control

This paper addresses the problem of unilateral contact interaction by an under-actuated quadrotor UAV equipped with a passive tool in a bilateral teleoperation scheme. To solve the challenging control problem of force regulation in contact interaction while maintaining flight stability and keeping the contact, we use a parallel position/force control method, commensurate to the system dynamics and constraints in which using the compliant structure of the end-effector the rotational degrees of freedom are also utilized to attain a broader range of feasible forces. In a bilateral teleoperation framework, the proposed control method regulates the aerial manipulator position in free flight and the applied force in contact interaction. On the master side, the human operator is provided with force haptic feedback to enhance his/her situational awareness. The validity of the theory and efficacy of the solution are shown by experimental results. This control architecture, integrated with a suitable perception/localization pipeline, could be used to perform outdoor aerial teleoperation tasks in hazardous and/or remote sites of interest