Symbiotic relationship between robots - a ROS ARDrone/YouBot library

A Symbiotic relationship between robots is theoretically developed. It is characterised by sharing sensory information and tightly coordinating operational logic by taking care of each other’s needs during missions. The system is characterised by an intertwined reasoning system while having separate conditioning and execution of plans to achieve subgoals to support each other. The results are illustrated on strong operational inter-dependence of a rover and a drone through shared logical inference. The drone uses the rover as a landing pad and the rover uses the drone to complements its sensor system by information gathering. There is a GitHub library provided in association with the demonstration for generic use of adding cameras and cooperation logic to a AR.Drone 2.0 and a KUKA youBot system. The benefits of symbiotic relationship are quantitatively evaluated on the demonstration example

Towards Software Based Optical Communication Methods for the Assistance of Docking Autonomous Underwater Vehicles

The use of optical communications systems is prevalent in underwater robotics when short-range data transmission is required or preferred. This paper proposes a method of producing and testing an optical communications system for use in the assistance of optical docking for autonomous underwater vehicles (AUVs). It describes how the Simulink modelling environment was used to program and simulate a model of a transmitter, which was then implemented on a microcontroller. The transmitter model implemented on hardware was then used to produce an optical signal, which was sampled, logged and used to design a receiver model in Simulink. For signalling purposes, the experiment used a light-emitting diode (LED) with a driver circuit and photodiode based receiver. This simulated approach using real world data enabled the analysis of the system at every point during the process, allowing for a hardware in the loop style approach to be used in the receiver model design. Consequently, the Simulink Coder was used to produce the receiver model’s equivalent in C++ for later deployment. A benchmark was determined through experimentation to compare within future studies; the system was tested and found to operate effectively at distances between 1 m and 12 m in a controlled in air test environment

Hidden cusps

International audienceThis paper investigates a situation pointed out in a recent paper, in which a non-singular change of assembly mode of a planar 2-RPR-PR parallel manipulator was realized by encircling a point of multiplicity 4. It is shown that this situation is, in fact, a non-generic one and gives rise to cusps under a small perturbation. Furthermore , we show that, for a large class of singularities of multiplicity 4, there are only two types of stable singularities occurring in a small perturbation: these two types are given by the complex square mapping and the quarto mapping. Incidentally , this paper confirms the fact that, generically, a local non-singular change of solution must be accomplished by encircling a cusp point

Perturbation of symmetric 3-RPR manipulators and asymptotic singularities

International audienceSmall perturbations can affect the kinematic properties of manipulators with non-generic architecture. We study in this paper the perturbations of symmetric planar 3-RPR manipulators. We show in particular that one can obtain any of the three possible stable types of behaviour of 3-RPR manipulators for large values of the lengths of the legs

Quantifying situation awareness for small unmanned aircraft Towards routine Beyond Visual Line Of Sight operations

A novel statistical model is presented to quantify situation awareness in the operation of small civilian Unmanned Aircraft Systems (UAS). Today, the vast majority of small UAS operation takes place under Visual Line Of Sight (VLOS) of a human operator, who is wholly responsible for the safety of the flight. As operation begins to move to Beyond Visual Line Of Sight (BVLOS), it is likely that this responsibility will become shared between operator and the increasingly autonomous UAS itself. Before we seek to quantify the safety of such a system, it is beneficial to analyse the safety of existing VLOS operations to provide a target level of safety. Prior to considering any on-board decision making, it is essential to ensure that the artificial situation awareness system of a UAS in BVLOS is at least as good as awareness of a human operator. The paper provides a probabilistic theory and model for the high level abstractions of situation awareness to guide future assessment of BVLOS operations

Inferior Vena Cava Thrombosis in Young Adults – a review of two cases

We present two cases of clinically extensive bilateral DVTs associated with inferior vena caval thrombosis. Young patients presenting with symptoms of DVT should be investigated not only to establish any thrombophilic pre-disposition, but to ascertain the proximal extent of thrombus which may itself influence treatment

How do ICP variants perform when used for scan matching terrain point clouds?

Many variants of the Iterative Closest Point (ICP) algorithm have been proposed for registering point clouds. This paper explores the performance of 20,736 ICP variants applied to the registration of point clouds for the purpose of terrain mapping, using data obtained from a mobile platform. The methodology of the study has involved taking sequences of 100 consecutive scans at three distinct scenes along the route of a mining haul truck operating in a typical surface mining environment. The scan sequences were obtained at 20 Hz from a Velodyne HDL-64E mounted on the truck. The aim is to understand how well the ICP variants perform in consolidating these scans into sub-maps. Variants are compared against three metrics: accuracy, precision, and relative computational cost. The main finding of the paper is that none of the variants is simultaneously accurate, precise, and fast to compute, across all three scenes. The best performing variants employed strategies that filtered the data sets, used local surface geometry in the form normals, and used the distance between points in one point cloud to a corresponding surface from a reference point cloud as a measure of the fit between two point clouds. The significance of this work is that it: (i) provides guidance in the construction of ICP variants for terrain mapping; and (ii) identifies the significant limitations of existing ICP variants for this application

Stimulating Interest in Medicine Assisted Manipulation (MAM)/Manipulation Under Anesthesia (MUA) as a Complementary Treatment Modality for Chronic Pain and Opioid Use

The objective of this clinical review is to stimulate interest in medicine assisted manipulation (MAM), also known as manipulation under anesthesia (MUA). By providing evidence from published studies regarding the use of MUA, as well as identifying its benefits and limitations, our group hopes to increase awareness of this technique and contribute to its implementation to assist in overall pain reduction and reduce opioid medication dosing. A retrospective literature review was undertaken to investigate the extent of published information on the topic in order to compile evidence based data and provide the reader with a summary of both the benefits and the flaws of the technique. We intend for this manuscript to serve as a starting point to stimulate readers’ interest into further research and discussion on MUA. We see MUA as a means of providing patients with additional treatment options as well as an opportunity to raise awareness of an uncommon, yet effective, manipulative technique